Agenda - 02-05-2008-11a - Laserfiche WebLink

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It is important to note that the impact of any landfill bans will be different on each of the three distinct sectors that deliver waste to the MSW Landfill (Residential, Multifamily, and Commercial). Other issues that should be considered when contemplating bans include enforceability, the estimated percent of the banned material that is reasonably recoverable, public resistance to any potential bans, the recycling program's ability to manage the banned materials, and the time and effort needed to prepare for and implement associated recycling efforts. Additionally, when considering the space-saving consequences of a ban, it is important to consider not only the tons of material diverted, but more importantly the volume or space that the material would occupy in the landfill. While this may seem a subtle distinction, because different materials behave differently when compacted and as they age . in the landfill environment, a material that may generate a large tonnage diversion such as food waste may not necessarily result in a large amount of space-savings due to the materials density and composition. Food waste, for example, is largely water and highly compactable thus high tonnage may not result in high space savings where a low density material might have the opposite impact, low tonnage but higher space savings. The materials staff believed could be considered for landfill bans in this report include: • newspaper, • glossy magazines, • plastic bottles (a state-wide landfill ban comes into effect on October 1, 2009), • residential corrugated cardboard (a ban of commercially (non-residential) generated corrugated cardboard is already in effect), • commercially produced waxed corrugated cardboard (heretofore considered "unrecyclable"), • clean wood waste from the residential sector (a ban of commercially generated clean wood waste is already in effect), • commercial food waste from large generators, and • Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs) that would mostly be televisions and older computer monitors. When considering the implementation of further landfill bans, it is important to consider the timing, cost to implement, and amount of landfill space saved. The effort and logistics necessary to put the bans in place would require staff resources from the County and the Towns and would result in expenses directly to the Solid Waste enterprise fund as well as to the municipalities as they make their own enforcement efforts as they've done on the RRMO. Additionally, implementing all the above listed bans effectively by mid-year 2008-09 would be a very ambitious goal that would only save an estimated 1.5 months of landfill space. The public and waste haulers would need significant education and advanced notice prior to the implementation of the bans. The original cardboard ban, passed in 1995 and first enforced in 1996, took over a year to implement and then another year to make fully effective after getting municipalities involved and further fine-tuning. The RRMO took two years to become effective, and has resulted in significant shift of construction and demolition waste tonnage from the County's facility to certified private out-of-County processors for sorting as well as some `sneaking away' to private landfills. In terms of space-savings, different items result in different amounts of diversion and landfill space saved. While implementing a ban of the lead-bearing Cathode Ray Tubes commonly associated with televisions and computer monitors will not result in significant space savings, it 3