EfW has sometimes been criticised as being harmful, especially with regard to emissions, although independent scientific studies have shown that these allegations are not true.
Concerns about the health of people living near an EfW facility have been addressed by the UK Committee on Carcinogenicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products & the Environment. In its March 2000 report (prior to even tighter emission standards being introduced), it said: ‘The Committee is reassured that any potential risk of cancer due to residency (for periods in excess of 10 years) near to municipal solid waste incinerators was exceedingly low and probably not measurable by the most modern epidemiological techniques. The Committee agreed that, at the present time, there was no need for any further epidemiological investigations of cancer incidence near municipal solid waste incinerators.’ In March 2009, in the light of more recent research, the Committee concluded that there was no need to change its earlier advice (For further information , page 73).
Dieter Schrenk, Professor of Toxicology at the University of Kaiserslautern, Germany and a World Health Organisation adviser, critically reviewed many peer-reviewed studies and two others by the British Society of Ecological Medicine and Greenpeace on the issue of exposure, health effects and municipal waste incinerators in 2006. He concluded: "... modern municipal waste incinerators can be regarded as safe facilities which have an imperceptible impact on the environmental and health situation in their neighbourhood" ("Health effects of municipal waste incinerators – a literature survey", Dieter Schrenk, MD PhD, Professor of Toxicology, University of Kaiserslautern, Germany, 2006).