Body parts-powered electricity in Salem?

Is Portland powered by Canadian corpses? The Associated Press is reporting that “The Marion County Board of Commissioners in Salem has ordered an incinerator to stop accepting boxed medical waste to generate electricity after learning the waste it’s been burning may include tissue from aborted fetuses from British Columbia.”

It sounds like the issue for the commission is that there might be some tissue from fetuses in the sealed boxes that are being sent to Salem from British Columbia.

Right, squeamish commissioners, never mind the other leftover body parts that have apparently been generating power in Oregon: “Kristy Anderson, a British Columbia Health Ministry spokeswoman, told The Associated Press that regional health authorities there have a contract with a company that sends biomedical waste, such as fetal tissue, cancerous tissue and amputated limbs, to Oregon, where it’s incinerated in the waste-energy plant.”

The AP story continues:

“The facility is owned and operated by Covanta in a partnership with Marion County. According to its website, it processes 550 tons per day of municipal solid waste, generating up to 13 megawatts of energy sold to Portland General Electric.

Marion County estimates that the facility processes about 700 tons of in-county medical waste each year and about 1,200 tons from elsewhere, making it a small percentage of the total waste burned. Out-of-town medical waste is charged a higher fee.”

Yes, Portlandia, you are running your iPhones on renewable energy powered by amputated limbs and cancerous tissue.

I feel like this could be taken to a whole new level. Why get cremated or have a green burial when you could send your body to Marion County and become electricity instead? I see a whole new renewable energy industry in Oregon out of this, if we can just make sure all those burning bodies and body parts don’t affect our clean air. I can see the slogans now: “When your lights go out, ours go on!”

As the Schoolhouse Rock song goes, “Where do you think it all comes from? Electricity, electricity.”

A Note From the Publisher

Dear Readers,

The last two years have been some of the hardest in Eugene Weekly’s 43 years. There were moments when keeping the paper alive felt uncertain. And yet, here we are — still publishing, still investigating, still showing up every week.

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