"Incinerator still being built for Six Nations landfill site"

Six Nations is paying $400,000 to help an inventor complete a waste disintegrator unit that was supposed to be delivered and operating at the landfill last Tuesday (Jan. 22) but the loaner unit is not finished yet.

Elected Chief Bill Montour said logistics and severe weather problems in the Maritimes are to blame for the delay in the construction and delivery of the Nova-Scotia-based company's machine here.

"You must consider that any project that depends on other suppliers to complete the total machine will most certainly have glitches," said Montour, in an email.

"In this case, the supplier of the computer logic system was delayed by the supplier. Assembly will be complete by Feb. 1 and he (Kearns) will be testing the machine shortly thereafter."

John Kearns, an inventor at the Kearns Waste Sciences Group, said the 20-tonne loaner unit is still in the assembly process and that's why it wasn't ready for the Jan. 22 launch date.

"That was the intent, but we're not God," he said. "There are no technological problems whatsoever."

He said it should be operating at Six Nations by the end of February.

Kearns said band council has already advanced his company $400,000 to complete the machine in a deal the two parties struck last fall that gives Six Nations a chance to test out the 20-tonne machine before it builds a permanent, custom-made unit specific to the community's waste needs.

The $400,000 will be considered a down-payment on a permanent machine that will be built once the community completes a waste audit determining Six Nations' long-term waste handling needs, said Montour.

"We negotiated with Kearns and the agreement is if we would advance Kearns $400,000 to complete the 20-tonne machine he had originally partially built for Peel Region, he would loan this machine to Six Nations," said Montour. "If there was agreement that the machine can do all that is advertised, Six Nations and Kearns would enter into another agreement for a permanent machine to be built to take care of Six Nations' waste."

Montour said the 20-tonne unit was originally partially constructed for the Peel Regional Municipality north of Toronto, but due to political reasons he's not privy to, the deal between Kearns and Peel fell apart.

Kearns already has a five-tonne prototype in place at the company's headquarters in Cape Breton, N.S., developed in the 1980s, that Montour and Councillor Wray Maracle viewed in action in 2008.

Montour said councillors will be travelling to Nova Scotia in the next two weeks to see the loaner machine in operation before bringing it here.

"I want to be able to determine that this machine works in their (Kearns) yard before it is deployed here," said Montour. "All of the components will be attached to the unit for the demonstration at the Kearns site and then dismantled and trucked to Six Nations. It will be reassembled for a community demonstration in disintegrating waste."

Montour said the parts necessary to complete the machine arrived at the company's headquarters last Friday.

This is council's second attempt at bringing waste removal technology to Six Nations.

After passing a motion in 2009 to spend $5 million in community gaming funds on a state-of-the-art incinerator plant, the deal with B.C. company EnEco Systems went sour. The two are now embroiled in a lawsuit to recover lost Six Nations funds.

"I can't have another experience like the EnEco Tops situation." said Montour. "I keep on Kearns on average twice a week."

The company is offering Six Nations a money-back guarantee if the system doesn't work.

"The $400,000 paid to complete the loaner machine would be applied to the cost of the permanent machine," said Montour. "If in the event that Six Nations is not satisfied and comfortable with the performance of the loaner machine, Kearns will remove it and reimburse the $400,000 back to Six Nations. That is the signed agreement."

In addition, Six Nations could end up hosting a facility manufacturing parts of the disintegrator technology, said Montour.

"If there is comfort to proceed with a permanent machine at Six Nations, Kearns will enter into a partnership agreement to manufacture some of the parts for future sales of the machine at Six Nations using Six Nations' steel manufacturing expertise," said Montour.

Developed in 1986 by Kearns, the technology has only been in operation in one other community in Canada, for four years in Sydney, N.S.

Montour said the advance of the $400,000 is not considered an investment in Kearns if the project doesn't work, because the negative publicity gleaned will make it hard for Kearns to sell the technology to other communities, even with the refund.

The technology Kearns invented aims to process household waste through a super-heated disintegration process that leaves behind an ash-like material that can be added to asphalt.