Anthony Orlando has spent nearly 25 years working at Covanta Energy. The CEO since 2004, he discussed a number of topics including zero waste, waste-to-energy, and new technologies during an interview with Waste & Recycling News.
From the interview:
Q: In general, what does the future look like for waste-to-energy plants in the U.S.?
A: From an industry perspective, I think the greatest growth prospects today are outside the U.S. The regulatory landscape clearly drives a lot of what we see in our industry, but there are a couple of other factors that are particularly affecting the near-term [future in the] U.S. I want to really emphasize that this is a near-term issue. One of those is government policies; the other is energy prices.
We are seeing very low energy prices in the U.S. today. Natural gas prices are down. They are actually near their 10-year lows and, of course, a compelling economic reason to build an energy-from-waste facility is the energy recovery that you can garner from that waste stream.
But I think when we look longer term we know energy prices will move up and down. We will continue to see a push for more recovery, better efficiency and packaging, and all those things that are absolutely appropriate, sustainable.
