"The story of Stuff" explains very simply the connections between a huge number of environmental and social issues, and calls us together to create a more sustainable and just world. It becomes very clear that one of the reasons we are in crisis is that we try to operate on a linear system of cyclical consumption, but we live on a finite planet. You can not run a linear system on a finite planet indefinitely.

In today's world, there is the requirement of perpetual or cyclical consumption in order to keep the entire economy going. If consumption was ever to stop, the whole system would collapse. Products are often made of cheap materials and poor design, for not only are resources being neglectfully used in products that are designed not to last, wasting human energy and materials, but the amount of frivolous waste and pollution that results is staggering. Waste is a deliberate byproduct of industry's need to keep 'cyclical consumption' going¹.

The idea of consuming as much as possible, and then simply dumping everything in a landfill is plain ridiculous for anyone having the slightest knowledge of the law of conservation of mass/matter by the father of modern chemistry, Antoine-Laurent de Lavoisier, and the idea of burning useful materials is even more dishonest and frightening.

Doctor Stefano Monatari,
leading expert
on nanopathologies.

In the last article's we've seen a short video presenting the problems of a typical incineration facility, in which I depicted the problems in a broad view. Today we'll dig deeper and discover the health problems caused by waste incineration. With an exclusive interview, Doctor Stafano Montanari elucidates the current situation, the state of the art in technology and a possible vision for the future.

Stefano Monatanari is the scientific director of Nanodiagnostics, a research lab based in Modena, operating in the medical, industrial and ecological fields. Its main activity is the survey, through an innovative technique of environmental electron-microscopy, of inorganic micro- and nano- particles in any medium (biological tissues, food, drugs, cosmetic products, environmental samples, et cetera). He and his wife, Antonietta Gatti, are leading researchers in the field of nanopathologies. He's author of several articles and scientific publications, most notably "Nanopathology: the health impact of nanoparticles"(Antonietta M. Gatti, Stefano Montanari, Pan Stanford Publishing, 2008), as well as general audience books, and inventor of various medical equipments.

Without further ado, I leave you with the interview.

1. What kind of research are you conducting? What scientific achievements have you reached?

About 12 years ago we discovered that micro- and nano-particles, no matter how generated, can enter mainly through inhalation and ingestion the human organism and, once in the blood stream, be the cause of hypercoagulation (stroke, infarction, pulmonary thromboembolism). But, if such a reaction doesn't occur (just about 10% of the population is prone to that) those particles are sequestered by tissues and organs. There they are perceived as foreign bodies and, because of that, they trigger the formation of an inflammatory tissue that may revert to cancer. Further consequence of the presence of non degradable nor biocompatible particles our organism is incapable of getting rid of is their migration from mother to fetus. Hence miscarriages and malformations. That kind of fine and ultrafine dust is also an endocrine disruptor and can thus induce diseases like thyroidites and diabetes. An important consequence to all that has been found to be the diseases a number of veterans from the Balkans and the Gulf Wars suffer from. Those discoveries are our main scientific achievement.

2. As of today, the waste that reamins after recycling goes to incinerators, which provides heat and electricity. Japan, Denmark, and Sweden are leading the way. What's wrong with that?

The fact that incineration is in striking contrast with the principle of conservation of mass. Not a gram of waste is destroyed and, as toxicologists are perfectly aware of, burning means transforming harmless things into pathogens. Many questions, then, remain unanswered. For instance, what happens with elements like mercury, arsenic, lead, etc. that enter the composition of regular urban waste?

3. Is there any way to prevent nanoparticles to be emitted from incinerators? How bad are they for our health? (if possible some statistics of tumors in population nearby incinerators)

Not with the present technologies. Italy has already produced ten epidemiology researches around incinerators and all show an increase of cancers in those territories. But it must be kept in mind that tumours are not the first kind of pathology caused by micro- and nanoparticles. As a matter of fact, cardiovascular diseases are far more common, though they are never considered in those epidemiology surveys. Nor do they consider miscarriages, fetal malformations, endocrine and neurological diseases, etc. The main problems due to micro- and nanoparticles have been briefly described above.

4. What is the environmental impact of incinerators, both as pollution and as CO2 emissions? Could you provide some data?

The question can't be posed like that. The impact depends on many factors: Among them how large the incinerator is, what it burns, where it is located, how large the city is, what other high-temperature sources there are, what they are and where they are placed, what the traffic is like, what the geographical and meteorological situations are, etc.

5. What would be the best way of handling waste? Is there any solution to incineration?

The easiest waste to handle is the one that does not exist. So, the first thing to do is stop producing useless garbage. The excessive use of packaging, of plastic materials and of ill-planned products along with the attitude of behaving like spoilt children is the core of the problem. Among all the methods to deal with waste, incineration is the only one devoid of scientific ground and, it must be added, of common sense. So, it is the only solution that must be discarded without any discussion.

6. If you could chose where to spend money and effort for solving the climate crisis, what would you do as first priority?

I would spend that money to boost research in the field of exploiting the huge energy the sun delivers every second to our planet and that we snob. The easy availability and the consequent low cost of oil, natural gas and uranium has been the main obstacle to technological progress for many years. Now, reason warns us that we can't afford to count on those energy sources any more.

p.s. This article was crossposted on the my blog.