Environmentalists spoke out Thursday against recent changes in Ontario that reduce government controls — and public consultations — for municipal waste projects such as those that burn waste to produce energy.

About a dozen people from groups such as the Sierra Legal Defence Fund and Power (Protect Our Water and Environmental Resources) held a news conference inside the Ontario legislature to criticize changes to legislation announced last Friday by Ontario's Liberal government.

The changes mean a full environmental assessment is no longer required for projects that convert waste into energy, including those that do so through incineration — a process the groups strongly oppose.

"Current incineration technology, like its predecessor, puts public health up in smoke," said Dr. Paul Connett, professor emeritus of chemistry and toxicology at St. Lawrence University in New York state, in a statement issued at the news conference.

A news release from the Sierra Legal Defence Fund argued that the government should be focusing on recycling, which it said was up to 25 per cent more efficient at recovering the energy contained in waste materials than methods involving combustion.

MPP Peter Tabuns, who is the NDP's environment critic, said at the news conference that the new regulations represent a major flaw in the McGuinty government's environmental policy.

"You cannot say that you're committed to stopping climate change and say you're in favour of incineration," Tabuns said. "You can't say that and be credible."

The government announced the changes in a news release issued March 23.

The new regulations reduce the required government approvals and controls for:

• Recycling facilities.
• Landfills and landfill expansions.
• Waste-to-energy projects.
• Use of agriculture and forestry waste as fuel and as raw materials for alternative fuels such as ethanol.
• Recycling hazardous wastes such as paint and electronics.
• Tests of new waste-to-energy technologies. 

Industrial, commercial or manufacturing facilities that produce energy from waste will not need an environmental assessment at all if they use less than 100 tonnes of waste per day.

Neither will projects processing less than 75 tonnes of waste per day to test new waste-to-energy technologies such as plasma gasification.

Plasma gasification, which will soon begin testing in Ottawa, breaks waste down to glass and gasses under high heat. Because little oxygen is involved, the waste does not burn. However, the hydrogen gas produced is burned to generate electricity.

For larger waste-to-energy projects, including ones involving incineration, the full environmental assessments will be replaced with a smaller screening process.

However, Environment Ministry spokesman John Steele said a full environmental assessment may still be required if the public petitions for one and provides a reasonable rationale.

All waste-to-energy projects will still have to meet provincial air pollution regulations.

Premier Dalton McGuinty said he wants the province to be a leader in developing new ways of using waste to produce energy.