Pyramid Scheme?

Kristin Smith

There is a disconnect between how the U.S. Environmental Agency (EPA) recommends waste be handled and what is actually being practiced in the U.S.

Illustrated using an inverted pyramid, the EPA’s Nonhazardous Waste Management Hierarchy shows the largest part of the pyramid or portion of the waste stream going toward source reduction and reuse, followed by recycling/composting. The next most preferred use of waste in the pyramid is energy recovery, followed by the smallest tip of the pyramid representing the portion EPA suggests could be sent for treatment and disposal.

Anyone in the solid waste industry knows that most parts of the U.S. aren’t practicing what EPA is preaching. Millions of tons of solid waste are being disposed of in landfills each year — a much larger percentage than what goes into U.S. waste-to-energy (WTE) facilities.

Discussions with Californians during the Renewable Energy from Waste Conference in San Jose, California, in November paint a picture in that state of policies which inhibit the development of WTE in favor of landfilling, even though landfill capacity is reaching critical levels in many parts of the state. In fact, Jim Miller, CEO of JR Miller and Associates, Brea, California, teaches his UCLA students what he calls the “real-life” California Waste Management Hierarchy in which treatment and disposal comes before energy recovery in the pyramid.

Remarkably, in the U.S., while 28.9 percent of waste is recycled, only 7.6 percent goes to WTE plants. A staggering 63.5 percent of waste is landfilled. The European Union’s numbers are much closer to EPA’s recommended hierarchy. Its member countries recycle on average 42 percent of their waste, while 24 percent goes to WTE and 34 percent is landfilled. But still other countries in the EU perform even better, showing that the hierarchy is indeed possible (at least in Europe). Some countries in Europe average only 2 percent of waste going to landfill, with the remainder divided almost evenly between recycling and WTE.

Is it possible to achieve these numbers in the U.S.? Certainly the potential is there. The Energy Recovery Council’s 2014 Directory of Waste-to-Energy Facilities, released in May, also seems to show the capacity is there with 84 WTE facilities in 23 states able to process a combined 96,000 tons of waste per day.

Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, is one place where the waste hierarchy is being abided by in the U.S., but until the policies and economics work for other communities, the EPA’s hierarchy will continue to be endorsed only as theory.
 

Renewable Energy from Waste’s offices have relocated to 5811 Canal Rd., Valley View, Ohio 44125, telephone: 216-393-0300 and fax: 216-525-0515.