Government to spend €3 million on disposal of laughing gas canisters

Sinn Féin spokesperson for Dublin, Mark Ward TD, has criticised the government for its approach to nitrous oxide canisters.

Deputy Ward was speaking following figures released from the Oireachtas Committee on Finance that stated the government will spend €3 million on waste management on nitrous oxide canisters.

“Figures have just been released from the Oireachtas Committee on Finance that show the government will spend €3 million on the waste management of nitrous oxide canisters this year, that is an increase of €1million on last year,” the Dublin Mid-West TD noted.

“I have been raising the health issues associated with the misuse of nitrous oxide for over 5 years now, and I have also highlighted the environmental impact that disposed canisters are causing.”

“Last week I attended a meeting organised by the Chartered Institute of Waste Management and Veolia that focused on the issues around disposal of nitrous oxide canisters. These can explode in waste processing centres.

“I was shown a canister that had exploded. To date €65 million worth of damage to these centres across Europe has been caused. I heard at the meeting several incidents of explosions in Ireland due to Nitrous Oxide canisters.

He said that the government spent €2.05 million last year to dispose of 64,000 large canisters and 96,000 silver bullets. This year they expect these figures to be 75,000 and 30,500 respectively, costing an additional €0.96 million. This brings the total figure to over €3 million.

He warned that the situation os is “only the tip of the iceberg; this is only the cost of disposing of canisters seized by customs. This does not include the canisters collected by local authorities and private waste companies.”

“You need only walk down any street or through any housing estate across the state and you will see discarded canisters on the ground.”

“This issue and cost would not arise if the government would regulate the sale of nitrous oxide.

“They could have done this by supporting my bill that Sinn Féin brought before the Dáil in January. The government instead decided to delay this legislation by 9 months. Figures released today show that this is a costly delay,” he said.