If you live in Washington or Ramsey counties in the Twin Cities, all your garbage will be burned, starting Jan. 1.
The counties are the first in the state to require that all garbage be sent to incinerators to generate electricity. The most immediate effect is on trash haulers, who must explain to customers why their rates are going up.
But they will notice, he said, when their bills increase.
Trash companies will pass along the 10 percent increase caused by the garbage-burning mandate, and they question the environmental benefits.
"We never had a raise like that before," said Greg Tennis, co-owner of Tennis Sanitation in St. Paul Park.
Incinerating garbage keeps it out of landfills and generates power for 20,000 homes, according to Zack Hansen, Ramsey County environmental health director.
The increased rates are the price of progress, he said. "Managing waste is a necessary public service — it’s like paying for sewers or streets."
Officials say they are required by law to find alternatives to landfills.
A 1989 law set up a hierarchy for waste management — with landfills being the worst way to treat garbage and reducing and recycling the best. Other options include composting or burning garbage.
To reduce landfill use, the counties bought a processing plant in Newport in 2015. The site had been a privately owned facility shredding garbage to be burned in electricity-producing incinerators. Haulers were free to haul garbage to the plant or take it anywhere else, including low-cost landfills.
It won’t change the amount of garbage burned, which remains at 460,000 tons annually.
Is it changing the amount of material going to landfills? Next year, 70,000 tons that now go to landfills annually will instead by processed by the plant. To compensate, the plant won’t be accepting 70,000 tons that come from other counties.
Ramsey County’s Hansen said the incineration mandate is a step toward setting up a start-to-finish waste system, in which less garbage would be generated, more would be recycled, and food waste and yard waste would be removed.
The counties are the first in the state to require that all garbage be sent to incinerators to generate electricity. The most immediate effect is on trash haulers, who must explain to customers why their rates are going up.
"I don’t think anyone thinks about where their garbage goes," shouted Mike Casson, over the clatter of the steel claw tossing trash into his Tennis Sanitation truck in Oakdale recently.
But they will notice, he said, when their bills increase.
Trash companies will pass along the 10 percent increase caused by the garbage-burning mandate, and they question the environmental benefits.
"We never had a raise like that before," said Greg Tennis, co-owner of Tennis Sanitation in St. Paul Park.
Incinerating garbage keeps it out of landfills and generates power for 20,000 homes, according to Zack Hansen, Ramsey County environmental health director.
The increased rates are the price of progress, he said. "Managing waste is a necessary public service — it’s like paying for sewers or streets."
Officials say they are required by law to find alternatives to landfills.
A 1989 law set up a hierarchy for waste management — with landfills being the worst way to treat garbage and reducing and recycling the best. Other options include composting or burning garbage.
To reduce landfill use, the counties bought a processing plant in Newport in 2015. The site had been a privately owned facility shredding garbage to be burned in electricity-producing incinerators. Haulers were free to haul garbage to the plant or take it anywhere else, including low-cost landfills.
Now all garbage from the two counties must be taken to the plant to have the recyclable materials removed and the garbage shredded and burned.
The mandate won’t change the budget for the plant — which is roughly $37 million annually.
It won’t change the amount of garbage burned, which remains at 460,000 tons annually.
Is it changing the amount of material going to landfills? Next year, 70,000 tons that now go to landfills annually will instead by processed by the plant. To compensate, the plant won’t be accepting 70,000 tons that come from other counties.
Ramsey County’s Hansen said the incineration mandate is a step toward setting up a start-to-finish waste system, in which less garbage would be generated, more would be recycled, and food waste and yard waste would be removed.
To read the full story, visit http://www.duluthnewstribune.com/news/4380437-two-minn-counties-burn-all-trash-incinerators-electricity.