WHY ARE WE THROWING MONEY INTO OUR LANDFILL?
If this headline caught your attention, then the details will really surprise you. The Georgia Department of Community Affairs retained a consulting firm specializing in solid waste issues to perform a multi-phase, statewide municipal solid waste characterization study of representative landfills to better understand just what is being disposed of in Georgia. Georgia has 159 counties that are grouped into 16 Regional Development Centers and samplings were taken in 13 of these regions. Floyd County is in the Coosa Valley RDC and Walker Mountain Landfill was selected as host facility for our region. This is especially lucky for us since Walker Mountain does not accept waste from outside of Floyd County so we know that our numbers come from our community only.
The results of this
study can be used for updating community solid waste plans, establishing a
waste diversion base line, identifying targeted waste stream commodities for
future diversion and helping determine facility sizing requirements. The consulting firm team sorted for a total
of 14 weeks – from Fall of 2003 through Summer of 2004 and actually collected
and analyzed over 60 tons of waste in all.
One reason for the length of time sorting was to document the variations
of discards by seasons. These
variations are due to things like holidays, tourism, growing seasons and
variations in food and beverage consumption under different weather conditions.
They set up a work area at Walker Mountain Landfill and selected sample sizes
of approximately 220 pounds from residential, commercial and mixed loads to
sort into 39 different categories divided into 7 major material groups. These major groups are paper, plastic, metals,
glass, organics (yard waste, wood, food, etc.), inorganics (electronics,
hazardous waste), and construction/demolition debris. The selected samples were dumped onto a tarped area so that
smaller particles, or “fines”, could be captured. Suited and gloved up
personnel manually loaded the samples onto a specially designed sorting table
which was covered by half-inch screening, and actually went through the trash
by hand putting the different materials into labeled tubs, weighing each tub
and recording the results. These
numbers were compiled and extrapolated into annual figures and published in a
comprehensive report that is available from DCA for those interested in more
detailed information.
Mr. Mike Beatty, Department of Community Affairs Commissioner, is quoted as saying “almost ˝ of the municipal solid waste heading to landfills could find a second life”. In other words, could be recycled! And if these materials were kept out of the waste stream and sent to recycling facilities instead of landfills, they have a market value worth hundreds of millions of dollars…and it’s costing millions more in disposal fees to send them to landfills. Now the headline of this article should make sense to the reader – not only are we throwing away valuable materials but we are paying to do it. Next month I will discuss the Walker Mountain Landfill numbers specifically and demonstrate how we in Floyd County are doing compared to State averages.