A 'ring of fire' could soon burn around one of Australia's major cities

Sunbury has hosted landfill for more than two decades, now with plans for a waste-to-energy incinerator. (ABC News: Norman Hermant)

Just 40 kilometres north-west of Melbourne, residents in Sunbury have finally had enough of being the city's dumping ground.

When soil contaminated with traces of PFAS was discovered while digging Melbourne's Metro Tunnel it was disposed of here.

Now there are plans for a waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerator that will burn 750,000 tonnes of rubbish a year.

It will operate 24 hours a day, every day, for the next 30 years.

"We're done with being treated as Melbourne's dumping ground," said Alison Medforth, addressing a rally against the proposed incinerator last month.

Last year she became increasingly concerned with plans for an incinerator just three kilometres from her home.

She started a Facebook group that evolved into a fully-fledged campaign, No Sunbury Waste Incinerator.

Alison Medforth's Facebook group evolved into a fully-fledged campaign. (ABC News: Norman Hermant)

"This is all about waste management and it is a quick fix to a long-term problem," she told 7.30.

"It's going to have far-reaching consequences, not only for the communities where they're located but all of Victoria."

Waste-to-energy, also known as energy-from-waste, is a landfill alternative used around the world.

Proponents bill it as a win-win: a way to divert rubbish from landfill and, at the same time, incinerate it to generate power for the grid.

Mark Rodgers, CEO of HiQ, the company behind the planned Sunbury incinerator, told a Victorian parliamentary inquiry last month the proposal is a key part of managing the amount of rubbish heading to landfill.

"Our Sunbury site has been in existence for 25 years, operating as a waste precinct," Mr Rodgers said.

"We see the best way for [a WTE incinerator] to assist, to manage the waste issue that we're having is part of an integrated precinct. And that's what we're proposing."

However, in nearly every community where WTE plants are being proposed across Australia they have attracted strong opposition.

Waste-to-energy facilities are seen as a solution to the landfill shortage. (ABC News: Margaret Paul)

No state has embraced WTE incineration more than Victoria. There are currently 11 licences making their way to final approval.

Controversy has focused on what opponents and some state politicians have been calling "ring of fire" proposals around metropolitan Melbourne, with waste incinerators planned for Laverton North, Sunbury, Wollert, and Dandenong South.

A map of Victoria, showing the plan