One of the big waste stories happening in The Heap's backyard is the solar farm currently under construction at the 48-acre Republic Services-owned Hickory Ridge landfill in DeKalb County, Ga. As the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports, the site is a much larger implementation of the widely-covered solar cap installed atop Republic's Tessman Road Landfill in San Antonio.

The Hickory Ridge solar cap is expected to generate 1 megawatt of power, enough to power 400 homes. The power will be sold to Georgia Power, says the AJC.

Be sure to watch Waste Age and The Heap for updates on this story.