KAMPAR: The plan to build a thermal waste treatment plant at the landfill in Papan has been put on hold.
Perak local government committee chairman Sandrea Ng said the Ipoh City Council was reconsidering the plan and would look at other means of managing waste.
"The agreement and discussions did not enter the final stage.
"There is a need to re-evaluate and look at the latest technology as a better option for the city council," she told a press conference after visiting the Kampar landfill and dog pound in Jeram here on Friday (May 9).
It had been reported in October 2023 that Ipoh would be the first city in Asia to use eco-friendly "Thermowaste" technology in managing its waste.
The council and two companies had signed a memorandum of understanding on the project.
Ng said a separate waste-to-energy (WTE) system is now being developed in Manjung and is expected to be operational by the end of the year.
She said the system is not the incinerator type but an anaerobic (digestion by micro-organisms) type, which can produce methane gas to be used for generating energy.
"It will help reduce the amount of waste sent to landfills effectively.
"We will evaluate its suitability and decide whether or not it can be expanded to other districts.
"There are still other factors to consider, including the number of employees (needed) under (each) local council and the location (to build the system)," she added.
Other factors to be considered include the amount of waste collected by the respective districts.
"We need to consider this for better optimisation of the system," she said, adding that another possibility was for several districts to be clustered and share one system.
