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Rob Arner
Virginia is poised to become the nation’s leader in accepting out-of-state waste. At present, Virginia is the second largest importer of trash behind Pennsylvania.
Over ten years ago the nation watched news of the infamous New York garbage barge as it searched for a place to landfill its trash. This incident created a myth of limited landfill space. Today, Pennsylvania and Virginia companies have tremendously over-built their disposal capacity to the extent that they could bury the entire country's waste far into the future. Currently, Virginia has a total capacity for disposal of approximately 300 million tons of garbage, almost twice the total amount of all municipal solid waste generated in the United States each year. This excess space has transformed the disposal of waste into a very competitive business, pitting local governments against the private sector. As we face this new tidal wave of waste, two key areas must be addressed; environmental and economic.
Among the most pressing environmental concerns is suspect private landfill insurance policies. Private landfills are required under State and federal environmental laws to maintain insurance policies in the event of failure during the operational life of the landfill. However, the majority of the private landfills in Virginia currently utilize “captive” self-insurance, which is a highly questionable practice through which companies can avoid government financial tests to meet their long term insurance requirements. The use of these “captive” private sector self-insurance programs warrants a greater government financial scrutiny since clean-up funds are not set aside in a trust fund for use once a landfill is closed. Thus, this thin veil of financial coverage does not address the potential long-term environmental problems. When the current market fails, government may have to shoulder the tremendous long-term financial responsibilities for Superfund style clean-up costs. Long term funds must be readily available to deal with the full costs of private landfills as a way of preventing any potential burden to future generations.
With respect to economics, this trash avalanche has depressed our more environmentally friendly integrated resource recovery facilities because private “mega-landfills” divert tremendous amounts of business. This threatens regional investments of billions of dollars in programs encouraged by citizens who wish to manage their waste responsibly. These programs include recycling, composting, household hazardous waste collection, and waste reduction education.
These newly developed “mega-landfills” have created fierce competition in the solid waste industry resulting in absurdly inexpensive disposal fees which have diverted revenues to finance local government integrated waste management programs. An integrated waste management process (1. reducing, 2. recycling and composting, 3. energy recovery and 4. landfill) provides for a safer long-term solution than wholesale landfilling. Local governments are also concerned about competition as a few firms dominate the market and small businesses are under-priced out of business. Cheap disposal lessens incentives to reduce waste, reuse, compost and recycle. These conservation programs are in jeopardy.
Local governments have been put in the position of having to reprogram operations and financing of their municipal facilities because of this ironic waste shortfall. Some local governments are now having to enact user fees or utilize general funds to insure their multi-million dollar bond investments in waste are protected.
If Virginia is now a leading importer of state waste by private haulers, who is going to be responsible and liable for long term health and safety issues resulting from these private landfills if they fail? Hopefully, wisdom will prevail and concerns about citizen safety and health will lead to the triumph of sensible management, not cheap short term waste disposal. One fact is evident, Virginians need to explore the full environmental, and economic factors resulting from our emerging role as a major trash repository.
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