The photos taken on a recent visit by business manager Reggie Castanares and several others from Hawaii at the site of the state-of-the-art waste recycling plant in Herhoh, Germany, leave nothing to the imagination in how its technology performs, the premises after each run virtually pristine.

As the nation’s only ocean-surrounded state, Hawaii lacks space to expand for additional solid waste treatment facilities, accentuated by Honolulu’s dilemma in finding a reliable long-term solution.

The awesome job of keeping Oahu clean through a network of landfill maintenance, collection centers and treatment plants is a cost burden that threatens to increase the City’s already staggering operations budget.

A controversial temporary fix is to ship compressed containers of waste materials to a mainland site but its start by the contracted hauler remains delayed. Meantime the H-Power plant’s equipment is aging and faces soon the need for costly repair or possible replacement.

The City Council committee on public infrastructures, disturbed by the contractor’s failure to begin towing away 100 tons annually, may consider looking at technologies used elsewhere that have proven capabilities and possibly lead to desirable environmental benefits and potentially substantial savings compared to present practice.

The committee at a recent meeting welcomed audience input. One briefly described a technology that he said provides additional benefits besides its primary function of transforming waste into energy. The entire process takes place in a recycling plant engineered and built by a German manufacturer known as Herhof GmbH.

Its patented Herhof Stabilat technology is fully operating in 40 composting plants worldwide and at 14 Stabilat plants in Europe, according to spokesman Paul Chinen, marketing director for Nevadabased Kamehameha Environmental, LLC, which is authorized to qualify Herhof projects globally.

The Herhof system is combined with different technologies to meet requirements defined by European and German legislation for emission control and protection of environment and public health. The result is a greatly reduced risk from impacts such as sewage water, smell, noise and dust, and health in general for employees, thanks to the system’s fully automated and enclosed process.

Local 675 Business Manager Reggie Castanares, said “seeing the treatment process in action, from material acceptance and preparation, shredding, bio thermal drying and separation, to the resultant use of recyclables and fuel, was simply incredible. All its byproducts, moreover, have marketable value.”

“I noticed a huge food processing plant just yards from the recycling plant, something you’d never expect in an industrial neighborhood, but, surprisingly, the usual acrid smell and harsh noise associated with waste treatment was totally absent,” he said. “What’s exciting is that such a plant can be built in any of our backyards within 18 months, effectively surpass EIS tests, and, as a ‘bonus’, provide taxpayers with an innovative system that offers positive paybacks.”

For more on Herhof, refer to: www.kamehamehaenvironmental.com