Blog 3

Covanta’s proposed Advanced Recycling Center Readings:

These readings painted the Covanta plan in a really positive light.  Not only would the environment be helped but it would come at no cost to Indianapolis residents.  This for most people is all the convincing they need.  It is also super convenient which is something that Americans love, it means almost no extra work for residents.  And even I will admit, it is difficult to see issue with the whole thing after reading about all of the positive effects on their fast fact sheet.  Their FAQ seemed to cover everything fully.  And honestly, I know that their are negative aspects to Covanta but their material really makes it seem like a good idea.  They claim that their reduced greenhouse gases would be equivalent to pulling 40,000 cars off the road. What’s not to like about that ?! This is where being critical and being an informed citizen is really important.  We need to trust that the citizens of Indy will not take all of this at face value and do research on their own.  

Opposition to the proposal Readings:

Reading the responses to Covanta who are opposed really changed the way I saw Covanta.  The negative responses given by IRC about all the negative effects such as penalizing the city makes me less inclined to believe Covanta.  However, at the same time, I feel like the IRC’s proposals are not a lot better and it sort of seems like the IRC has its own agenda too.  But since the city really signed their soul away there’s almost no way that any of this can really be reversed.  So I think the IRC needs to start working with Covanta which it seems like they aren’t.  It was also difficult to see how Covanta did not address any of the issues that the IRC brought up. This to me is a big red flag and it makes it seem like Covanta is really hiding something.