The Necessity of Landfill Diversion in the United States - Term Paper Example

The Necessity of Landfill Diversion in the United s Introduction As a highly industrialized country, the United s bears the distinction of having one of the most vibrant domestic manufacturing sectors that caters to its own market as well as abroad. However, it must be pointed out also that along with this distinction that is worth boasting about, the country also happens to be suffering from the negative consequences of consumerism. While a huge variety of commercial products are being marketed, the people’s tendency is patronize and purchase these, mindless of the fact that these or their packaging could only become waste. In fact, the U.S. is not just one of the world leaders when it comes to manufacturing consumer goods; it is also taking the lead in waste generation. In 2010 alone, “Americans generated about 250 million tons of trash and recycled and composted over 85 million tons of this material, equivalent to a 34.1 percent recycling rate” (EPA 2010). With this data, it would appear that every individual in the U.S. generates 4.43 pounds of waste every day. However, the possibility of solutions in the near future is still dim and proving this is another estimate from the Environmental Protection Agency or EPA that out of the 250 million tons generated, only 85 million tons of waste would actually make their way to the recycling and composting plants. This is only 34.1 percent of the waste generated. This means that majority of the said waste are directed to one of the most commonly used solid waste management method in the world, the landfill. There are basically two kinds of wastes, organic and non-organic. The former are those that could be left to decompose through natural means while latter could not be subjected to the same treatment because of its highly synthetic composition. Both, however, contribute to the growing problem of solid waste management, especially because both could become hazards to the environment. Despite the fact that organic wastes could decompose and its composition be assimilated by the soil, these could still produce threats to the environment. During the process of putrefaction, organic wastes are known to trigger gas emissions and leaching that could contaminate the air and the soil respectively. There have been many cases also where groundwater is contaminated because of leaching. The non-organic wastes, on the other hand, pose a threat to both humans and the environment because these could contain substances that could be toxic. Since non-organic wastes do not decompose, the solutions that have been applied to these are recycling and reusing. As for the organic wastes, these are delivered to landfills where these are left to decompose through purely natural means or through the intervention of certain treatment that would hasten the process. Due to the fact that landfills are basically environmentally hazardous, there had been various studies carried for the purpose of determining safer designs that could be applied for their construction. However, there have been countless cases when leaks did occur resulting to the bacterial or viral contamination of the groundwater. Aside from this, landfills also contribute to air pollution and to the greenhouse effect because of its methane emissions. In the U.S. and in Europe, where the landfill is an integral part of solid waste management, areas that could be designated for such purpose are fast running out even as the demand for more numerous and bigger sites continue to increase. It is because of the “large numbers and the expanses of valuable real estate they occupy” that the landfills are problems that are becoming increasingly serious (Tammemagi 5). With all these issues attributed to landfills, there is clearly a need to determine alternative solid waste management methods. The introduction of such methods should lead to the reduction of the U.S.’s reliance on landfills and to shift instead to methods that are more viable and safer for both humans and the environment. I. The Landfill Situation in the United States Waste Generation as against the Number of Landfills There are two historical conditions that prompt the U.S. to rely much on landfills; these are the huge quantity of solid waste that it continues to generate and the large tracts of land that it considers to be the unproductive and uninhabitable. However, as the economy is continues to encourage consumption, the demand to produce commodity goods has also resulted in more solid waste being created. A great percentage of the waste that goes directly to landfill sites is considered as municipals solid waste or MSW. This refers to the trash that commonly comes from households and other establishments, which originate from various consumer products. These include packaging, glass, plastics, food scraps, discarded home appliances and furniture. Hazardous wastes that come from industrial establishments are not MSW, which means that these are not supposed to be delivered to any landfill site. What is clear in this description though is that population growth has a direct effect on the increase of MSW being generated. However, it would be inaccurate to consider that population growth and the increase of MSW generation to be directly proportional. It must be pointed out that consumerism is a factor that encourages the individual to acquire more goods from which MSW would originate. Therefore, aside from population growth, the heightened consumerist tendencies of the people would also result in more MSW. From 1980 to 2010, the solid waste generated per person has increased from 3.66 to 4.43 pounds (EPA 2010). In fact, even if the U.S. only has 4.6 percent of the world’s population, it actually generates 33 percent of the world’s solid waste (Hosetti 20). With this information, it is indeed accurate to state that the increase of MSW generated in the country through the years has been very high. Since there is so much MSW being created every year, the demand for solid waste management methods that could accommodate these has also intensified. There are three basic methods of managing solid waste being implemented in the country. These are waste recovery, incineration with energy recovery, and discarding. The first two are methods that require treatment of waste in preparation for recycling, reusing, or incineration for energy production. Discarding, on the other hand means, delivery to landfill sites. It is also clear that the first two provides opportunities for contributing to the economy and are therefore considered to be sustainable. Landfills, on the other hand, tend to require more funds instead of generating it. There are already certain cases where these have been tapped to produce methane gas. However, aside from the fact that the technology for this has still not been optimized, the methane gas produced is usually not very significant. Of the total waste generated in the country as of 2010, 34.1 percent were subjected to recovery, which means that these were recycled, reused, or renewed (EPA 2010). The waste that was subjected to incineration for the purpose of energy recovery amounted to 11.7 percent only. The remaining 54.2 percent, which is obviously more than half of the total waste generated in the country, were sent to landfill sites. The figures only prove the point that most of the country’s wastes are still subjected to landfills instead of other more technologically advanced and environmentally safe methods. With the introduction and application of more improved technology for recycling and incineration with energy production, the reliance on landfills in the U.S. has been reduced through the years. In fact, “the number of MSW landfills decreased substantially over the past 21 years, from nearly 8,000 in 1988 to 1,900 in 2009—while average landfill size increased” (EPA 2009). This data does show that there were already positive developments in the effort to reduce dependency on landfills. However, it must also be pointed out that even as the number of landfill sites has been reduced significantly, the acreage or the capacity of landfills has actually increased through the years. This phenomenon could be attributed more to the incessant demand of the affected residents to set up landfill sites elsewhere and to the dwindling number ideal areas for solid waste disposal instead of actual efforts to come up with alternative solutions to the waste management problem. The EPA itself had admitted that the landfills’ decrease in number is a cause for alarm and this only gives ample proof to the theory that the declining trend does not necessarily mean that alternative methods have been found. This because the said agency failed to notice that “failed to notice was that landfills were getting bigger much faster, and that total landfill capacity was actually rising” (Shaw 5). It is clear that the reduction of landfill sites is not yet enough bases for declaring that the U.S. is in the process of getting over its dependency on this solid waste management method. Obstacles to Expansion and Growth There is certainly a need for increasing the capacity of landfill sites, considering the amount of waste materials being generated. This need, however, is only emerges because there has yet to be a method that could deal with the huge quantities of waste in the manner that landfill sites do. By just considering the land size of the country, it would indeed seem that there are still areas that could be allocated for landfills. However, determining the ideal area for landfill has become difficult as federal and state governments have laid out rigid rules that developers must follow. The said rules are ostensibly for the protection of the environment and for ensuring sanitation. The very first set of rules regarding the establishment of landfills already limits the areas. According to Title 40 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), which is covered by the Resources Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA), the locations where landfills could be built should not be near faults, flood plains, wetlands, and other areas declared as restricted by either the federal or the state government. Aside from the limitations set in determining areas for landfills, the construction of these facilities also follow certain rules that must be complied with. These involve the requirements for composite liners, the creation of leachate collection and removal systems, facilities for groundwater monitoring, plans for closure and post-closure care, system for corrective action, and financial viability (Criteria for Municipal Solid Waste Landfills Subpart D). With the opposition coming from the communities against the construction of new landfill sites in their respective areas and the rigid rules being implemented by the EPA and its counterparts in the state governments, it is clear that the potential for landfill expansion in terms of number of sites is insignificant. It is not just that the objective conditions surrounding it are not favorable that discourage the growth and development of landfills as solid waste management methods. Even by its very nature, landfills have certain environmental and sanitary issues that have not yet been addressed effectively. Due to decomposition, a landfill can produce dangerous amounts of methane which could pose threats to communities nearby. Methane is a highly volatile gas that could trigger explosions. However, on the positive side, this could also be tapped to and developed into a source of energy. The contamination of groundwater and surface water by leachate coming from landfills is another problem. Leachate is impossible to control even the landfill has been constructed per specifications of the EPA. As characteristic of liquid, it tends to ooze and finds its way into the ground. When New York’s Fresh Kills was still in operation, it was the largest landfill in the country. It has been close since 2002 but it still continues to produce 1million gallons of leachate every day (Raven et al 483). Despite the fact that various landfill designs have been introduced to control leachate effectively, this remains to be a challenge that developers have yet to surmount. Unless a landfill expands freely, its capacity to receive MSW would always have a limit. This is definitely a problem for a society like that of the U.S. which never ceases or controls the production of consumer goods from which wastes originate. Once a landfill reaches its capacity limit and if it could no longer expand the area that it covers, the operator would be compelled to cease operations and close it down. However, the landfill would remain to be an environmental hazard unless it is tended. It would continue to produce methane to pollute the air and emit leachate to contaminate groundwater and the soil itself. Because of this, the EPA does not allow a landfill operator to absolutely turn its back on the site once it decides to shut it down. The landfill operator is obligated to monitor the site and to conduct post-closure care for 30 years as mandated by Title 40 of the RCRA. The number of years that post-closure care must be provided to a landfill site only exposes further the seriousness of the hazard that it poses to the environment. The Economic Unviability of Landfills Establishing and operating landfills are expensive. As in other businesses, there are two types of costs to be covered; capitalization and operation. Capital costs include expenses for acquiring the land, building of facilities, purchase of equipment, and other requirements necessary to construct a landfill site. The operation costs, on the other hand, include refuse handling, maintenance, safety, training, administration, and gas and leachate control. The operator earns income from the payments made by companies that collect MSW from households and non-industrial facilities that generate non-toxic and non-hazardous wastes. Conscious of the fact that the operation of this particular kind of business would only last for as long as it is allowed to expand its landfill site, operators usually make sure to re-gain the capital that it has invested in a short time; thus allowing the company to accumulate higher profit margins. On the part of the government, it gains from the landfill operation through taxes. It is common among the states to impose higher taxes on the said businesses as a form of regulation. However, this practice only produced negative repercussions since “this will influence businesses, because a landfill tax will probably be passed forward into tipping fees but households will not be much affected unless the tax is passed forward into their marginal trash-disposal costs” (Porter 61). Companies that collect MSW from homes tend to increase their service charges. In this case, the high cost of landfills becomes even more apparent. The contribution of landfills to the economy is not significant although there are cases where the methane gas that these produce has been tapped to serve as fuel for electrical power generation. In fact, the existence and operation of such waste disposal facilities would only have a negative impact on certain areas of the economy. The research conducted by Richard Ready, which was largely based on his findings in the landfills in the state of Pennsylvania, has pointed out “that landfills that accept high volumes of waste (500 tons per day or more) have a greater impact on nearby property values than landfills that accept low volumes” (19). The value of real estate properties in areas surrounding landfill sites tend to drop because these normally become unattractive to potential buyers. With the aforementioned threats to the environment and sanitation, it is only expected that people would rather not reside near landfill sites. However, it is also because of the same issues that real properties nearby would still not sell despite the price drop. Aside from this, the idea that a landfill exists nearby generally make cities and towns less appealing to businesses also. As a result, any economic development plan created by the governments of the said localities would only be upset once a landfill site is established in or adjacent to its vicinity. There are, however, arguments that continue to defend the economic viability of landfill sites. The examples that are usually cited are those sites that have been developed in order to tap the methane gas emission for producing electrical power. However, even these landfill sites have to be operated in accordance to the 1991 landfill rules enforced by the EPA. According to the EPA, if the landfills strictly comply with the 1991 landfill rules, these “will save only 2.4 expected U.S. lives during the next three centuries and at a cost of a half-billion dollars a year” (Porter 65). By this statement alone, it is, obvious that landfills as a method of managing solid waste is not economically viable. II. Alternatives to Landfills With all the limitations and weaknesses of landfills discussed in the previous chapter, it is definitely clear that there is a need for alternatives. As had been proven already, the U.S. would certainly not go through the difficult process of searching for solutions that are environmentally and economically viable. There are actually three factors that lay bases for this approximation; first of all, the country actually has enough experience in dealing with MSW without resorting to landfills, second is that its current level of technology and industrial capability are keys towards the discovery and development of alternatives, and third is that there are other highly developed countries in Western Europe that have actually succeeded in landfill diversion. However, the country’s policymakers should first appreciate the situation regarding landfills and see the necessity of alternatives before the values of the said three factors would be recognized. As the country continues to produce waste as a consequence of its consumer-driven economy, the application of such alternatives is indeed urgent. The European Union has been confronting the issue of landfill diversion since the later part of the 1990s. In 1999, a directive regarding this was released by the Council of the European Union. However, it was soon found out that while the member countries of the EU were able to identify the problems that landfills have created, concrete and effective solutions have not yet been fully realized. Landfill diversion does not just mean limiting the volume of waste delivered to landfills. It also requires establishing the actual alternatives. In 2009, which was ten years after the landfill directive of the Council of the EU was released, John Hontelez, the European Environment Board secretary general, presented a paper that outlined certain actions that should be taken in order to address the problem (Bio-waste: The Need for EU Legislation 2009). In the paper, he raised suggestions that could be considered as viable alternatives to landfills. Among these are the promotion of home composting in residential areas where this is possible, the “separate collection of bio-waste and biological treatment of bio-waste through a combination of anaerobic digestion and composting wherever possible,” the establishment of “binding targets for composting to drive both prevention and separate collection,” and the definition of “consistent limit values for high-quality composted materials to be considered as products, establishing separate collection as a prerequisite” (Hontelez). These suggestions are not just alternatives to landfills but also to other common waste management practices that are already being conducted. The possible alternatives that have been pointed out may have been presented as suggestions for application by the countries that are part of the EU. The U.S. may consider the said suggestions and implement it in states or localities which these may be possible. However, it is also necessary to treat the general problem of solid waste management itself. The issue on landfills as inadequate and environmentally and economically unviable would not have evolved if waste generation in the country has been successfully kept at the minimum. Therefore, even as alternatives to landfills are being considered, controlling the sources of waste is also a concern that should be treated. III. Conclusion As a capitalist country, it is the nature of the U.S. to increase the production of commodity goods in order to meet the demand of the markets and for businesses to achieve its target profits. However, it is also in the process of doing these that waste is generated in amounts that continue to increase annually. There may have been a number of solid waste management methods that have been introduced and applied but more than half of the wastes are still being delivered to landfill sites. For many years, landfills have proven to be more detrimental to the environment, to people, and to the economy. The number of landfills may have decreased but this not because of conscious efforts to shift to alternatives but because of the objective limitations set by location and government restrictions. In fact, the sizes of the landfill sites have grown and may have even recovered what was lost with the decline in numbers. With the threats posed by landfills on both the environment and the economy, there is the urgent need to introduce alternatives to landfill sites. The U.S. is a country that is enjoying the benefits of high technology. It also has rich experience in solid waste management methods other than landfills. It therefore has the subjective condition to determine more viable means of dealing with solid waste. It may not only appreciate its own experience and potential to do so. If could also learn from the experiences of other developed countries. Works Cited Environmental Protection Agency. “Municipal Solid Waste Generation, Recycling, and Disposal in the United States: Facts and Figures for 2010.” 7 May 2012 . Environmental Protection Agency. “Municipal Solid Waste in the United States: Facts and Figures for 2009.” 7 May 2012 . Hontelez, John. “Bio-waste: The Need for EU Legislation.” European Environmental Bureau. 09 May 2012 . Hosetti, B.B. Prospects and Perspective of Solid Waste Management. New Delhi: New Age International, 2006. Porter, Richard. The Economics of Waste. Washington, DC: Resources for the Future, 2002. Raven, Peter; Berg, Linda and David Hassenzahl. Environment. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2011. Ready, R. “Do Landfills Always Depress Nearby Property Values.” Rural Development Paper No. 27. University Park, PA: The Northeast Regional Center for Rural Development, 2005. Shaw, Jane. Eight Great Myths of Recycling. Bozeman, MT: PERC, 2003. Tammemagi, Hans. The Waste Crisis: Landfills, Incinerators, and the Search for a Sustainable Future. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. “Title 40: Protection of Environment.” Resources Conservation and Recovery Act. Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d. Read More