Wake County’s landfill looks to be completely full by 2040, and there’s no room to build another one within the county, leaving local officials searching for solutions. Meanwhile, landfill workers are aiming to reduce waste by educating people on how to decrease their trash amounts. “The first thing you will notice is the smell of garbage. We’re looking at about 1,500 tons that have just come in today,” Sara Davarbakhsh, the environmental education program coordinator for Wake County, said. “One thing I’ve noticed in this industry is it never stops. Every single day trash is coming in.”
The Wake County Landfill is a busy place. Tons of garbage is dropped off there each day, 365 days a year. Heaps of discarded everyday items are hauled in and shifted around. “We receive anywhere from 155 to 175 garbage trucks per day,” Davarbakhsh said.
All of the garbage had to come from somewhere, and Davarbakhsh leads bus tours of the landfill in order to educate people about the impacts of landfills and trash. “The truck comes on collection day, and they pick up that cart. It disappears. It’s empty and you fill it up again. You never think that there’s an impact,” Davarbakhsh said.
The tours are free and open to the public, because regardless of someone’s age or background, if they live in Wake County or just happen to visit, they are contributing to the landfill in one way or another. “We want to show people the effects that their trash has on the environment, and all the complicated engineering features that are required to manage the amount of pollution that comes from landfills. How much time and resources and expense that it costs to build these landfills when if we could reduce our waste then the problem wouldn’t be as big,” Davarbakhsh said.