Gareth Jones, of Indaver, said harmful emissions would be minimised using processes to capture acid gases, heavy metals and dioxins.
He added that there would be no smell coming from the chimney “because the smells are caused by any organics, and they’re all destroyed by the incinerator”.
Any potential smells might come from the waste as it was being delivered, Mr Jones said, adding that the rest of the facility “is under negative pressure”, drawing air into the incinerator and not releasing odours into the countryside.
He also addressed residents’ concerns about the impact of more than 400 lorry movements a day on the roads, especially on the A120, which has the site’s only available entrance for lorries.
“All of that waste is already on the road going somewhere else, so we’re not adding extra traffic to the road network,” he told the BBC.
“Even with that total amount of trucks on the A120, that’s only 2% of the volume of the traffic already on the A120, so it’s not a significant increase.”