
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 11, 1992                   TAG: 9203110165
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: By MARY BISHOP STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SIERRA CLUB SAYS TARMAC AD A MISREPRESENTATION

Roanoke's Sierra Club group has accused Tarmac's Roanoke Cement Co. of misrepresenting the national environmental organization's stand on hazardous-waste burning in cement kilns.

In an advertisement last month in the weekly Fincastle Herald, Tarmac said the Sierra Club supports hazardous-waste incineration "as a viable treatment technology."

Michael Roebuck, chairman of Sierra's Roanoke River Group, said the national organization and its local branch oppose the burning of hazardous waste in cement kilns under current federal regulations.

"Tarmac has attempted to deceive the public into believing we support their plan," he said in a statement released Tuesday.

Roanoke Cement Co., located in Botetourt County, is seeking government permission to burn the waste as a fuel.

Rather than exchange salvos about what the national Sierra Club has said about waste-burning, Tarmac would like one of its engineers to come to a Sierra Club meeting in Roanoke and explain its plans for the Botetourt County plant. "We'd welcome that with open arms," Roger Anderson, chief engineer at Tarmac's Norfolk office, said Tuesday.

John Lambert, Roanoke spokesman for Tarmac, said such a meeting has been discussed with Roebuck.

Roebuck said a national Sierra policy cites 10 conditions that should exist before cement kilns burn the waste. The list includes an inspector chosen by a citizens' committee to check the waste-burning and a special tax to compensate the community for health testing and other precautions.

"As far as we know," Roebuck said, "we haven't seen any of [those conditions] from Tarmac."

Roebuck said the Sierra club "cautiously admits" that incineration of certain hazardous waste may be necessary, but approves of it only under tight controls.

The Roanoke River Group specifically opposes Tarmac's government applications to burn hazardous waste, Roebuck said, because local and federal regulations are inadequate and because the state attorney general's office has a history of "insufficient" enforcement of state environmental regulations.

by CNB