North Macedonia faces significant challenges with inefficient waste management and high electricity prices. Waste-to-Energy (WtE) technology offers a promising solution by converting waste into usable energy, thereby addressing both problems simultaneously. This study aims to assess the environmental feasibility and energy generation of WtE projects, while also examining if the country’s young citizens are ready for the next sustainable step. A mixed-methods approach was used, combining a quantitative survey (a sample size of 107, 94% of which were young citizens aged 18–38) with a comparative analysis of international WtE models. We derived the results of the survey using an ordinal logistic regression method. Results show high awareness among youth and a strong willingness to participate if the government invests in sustainable projects. Comparative insights highlight Singapore as a viable benchmark for scalable WtE implementation, its TuasOne WtE plant produces 1.05TWh of electricity annually burning 1.31 M tons of waste, while we calculated the potential of North Macedonia to be 1.01 TWh by incinerating ~ 1 M tons of non-hazardous waste, which is 34% of total domestic electricity needs, this would reduce North Macedonia’s energy dependency significantly. Our findings suggest that WtE can be a viable solution for North Macedonia, if it is paired with improved recycling and careful implementation.