10 Things You Need to Know For the Waste & Recycling Industry Today (April 24, 2014)

Duke Puts $10B Pricetag on North Carolina Coal-Ash Cleanup “Duke Energy Corp. said the total tab for cleaning up its North Carolina coal-ash dumps may reach $10 billion amid a call for national rules to regulate the disposal of the fossil-fuel byproduct. Duke plans to spend $2 billion to $2.5 billion to handle coal ash at its Riverbend and Dan River, the Charlotte, North Carolina-based company said in a statement yesterday.” (Insurance Journal)

World’s largest tire recycling plant ramps up in Houston “At the beginning of May, Genan plans to start up full production at what it has declared the world’s largest tire recycling plant. This new plant, which sits on 40 acres of land, is located at 18038 Beaumont Highway in northeast Houston. Constructed over the last two years with an investment of $140 million, the Houston operation will have the capability to recycle about 10 million tires a year — about a third of all the used tires in Texas — and it will employ 60 workers.” (Houston Business Journal)

Blaze at KCK recycling facility burns much of 7 tons of material “Firefighters continued to patrol hot spots late Wednesday afternoon after battling a fire that burned much of 7 tons of recyclable materials in Kansas City, Kan. The blaze prompted more than a dozen fire trucks and vehicles to deploy to the Deffenbaugh Recycling facility in the 2400 block of South 88th Street, near Interstate 435 and the Kansas River. An open-air structure that housed some of the recyclables was heavily damaged, said Craig Duke, deputy chief of the Kansas City, Kan., Fire Department.” (KansasCity.com)

Medical Waste Used To Generate Electricity In Oregon May Contain Fetal Tissue “An Oregon county commission has ordered an incinerator to stop accepting boxed medical waste to generate electricity after learning the waste it's been burning may include tissue from aborted fetuses from British Columbia. Sam Brentano, chairman of the Marion County board of commissioners, said late Wednesday the board is taking immediate action to prohibit human tissue from future deliveries at the plant that has been turning waste into energy since 1987.” (Associated Press)

Teamsters Report Details Mounting Liabilities For One Of Republic Services’ Nuclear Waste Landfills “Today, the Teamsters released a report that details the escalating costs to the public and investors for Republic Services, Inc’s mismanagement of its Bridgeton/West Lake Superfund landfill in Bridgeton, Mo. The nuclear waste remediation has already cost Republic Services $219 million and may cost much more if the Army Corps of Engineers takes over the site.” (Teamster.org)

City settles with homeless to leave landfill “A Northern California city has reached a settlement with a group of homeless people who filed a federal lawsuit to prevent their eviction from a waterfront landfill. The city of Albany says Wednesday that it will pay 28 homeless people $3,000 each to leave the Bulb, a 40-acre site along the San Francisco Bay to be used for park land. Another two-dozen or so homeless people who stay at the site and are not covered by the settlement also must leave.” (Associated Press)

Is Landfill Gas Renewable? “When we think of renewable energy, we typically think of wind, solar, and hydroelectric energy sources. Should energy from landfill gas be added to this list? Currently, 36 states consider landfill gas to be a renewable energy source, and offer some financial incentive for its capture and use.” (TheTrashBlog.com)

Bill supporting West Maui biofuel facility advances “Maui legislators are pushing hard for Senate Bill 3008 SD1 HD1 - a measure that directly addresses the landfill waste issue on Maui in an environmentally sustainable way, said Tenth District Rep. Angus McKelvey of Lahaina. The bill seeks a special purpose revenue bond to facilitate the development of a waste conversion facility at the Central Maui Landfill and the Maui Energy Park project near the Lahaina Wastewater Reclamation Facility on land owned by Kaanapali Land Management Company.” (Lahaina News)

Hampton looking to leave regional refuse district “Town officials hope Hampton is granted permission next week to leave the Southeast Regional Refuse Disposal District, which governs the solid waste contract for 10 area communities. Voters overwhelmingly approved a warrant article in 2013 authorizing the town to withdraw from the district on the basis that Hampton won't have much influence during the negotiations for a new contract — the current contract expires at the end of June 2015 — despite the fact that Hampton is the largest community in the district and pays roughly half of the cost of the current contract.” (Seacoastonline.com)

City plans to ban commercial dumping of cardboard by 2018 “Calgary plans to ban businesses from dumping cardboard at landfills by 2018 and compostable organic waste by 2019, but officials hope lighter inducements will get businesses to green their waste systems before then. A recycling company urged a council committee Wednesday to speed up plans to get easily recycled paper products out of the landfill — where they make up nearly one-eighth of everything dumped.” (Calgary Herald)