PW Landfill and Piedmont Environmental Council Win Environmental Awards

The 2013 Virginia Governor’s Environmental Excellence Awards were announced on April 10, 2013, at the Environment Virginia Symposium in Lexington, VA. Among the nine Gold Medal Winners were two wonderful local organizations: Prince William County’s Solid Waste Division for its Sustainability Program and the Piedmont Environmental Council for its Land Conservation Program.

Prince William County’s Sustainability Program at the landfill encompasses recycling, groundwater protection, storm water management, erosion control, air quality monitory, alternative energy generation, material reuse and habitat development. As a part of its community outreach efforts, the landfill facilities have been opened to citizens, school groups, bird watchers, business groups and professional organizations. The Solid Waste Division shares credit for the program’s success with county management support, a strong working relationship with regulatory agencies, and community involvement and pride. Tom Smith, chief of the County’s Solid Waste Division, said, “Prince William County recognizes the importance of protecting the health, safety, and environment of the community we serve. I’m very proud of what the County has accomplished with regards to environmental sustainability.”

In 2012 the landfill was designated an “Audubon at Home” wildlife sanctuary. According to the Prince William Conservation Alliance, who organizes the annual Nokesville Christmas Bird Count, the Prince William County Landfill has the largest numbers of Bald Eagles in the county. On Christmas day 2012 the Birders counted 10 adults and 10 immature Bald Eagles, along with many gulls including 650 Ring-billed Gulls and three Great Black-backed Gulls.

The life expectancy of the landfill has been prolonged to 2065 through expanding recycling and composting in the county. The landfill is targeting to achieve 40% recycling countywide by 2015. The landfill is built as a series of cells that include liners of plastic membranes and watertight geo-synthetic clay liner fabric on the bottom along with a leachate collection system. At the end of each day, earth covers the trash deposited in the cell, to keep animals away and improve aesthetics. When a cell if full, it is capped to prevent (or at least limit) the rain that percolates through the landfill and covered in soil.

The PW Landfill has 48 groundwater monitoring wells, and 78 landfill gas extraction wells. Landfill gas is generated during the natural process of bacterial decomposition of organic material contained in the trash buried in the landfill. Landfill gas is approximately forty to sixty percent methane, with the remainder being mostly carbon dioxide with varying amounts of nitrogen, oxygen, water vapor, sulfur, and other contaminants. The gases produced within the landfill are either collected and flared off or used to produce heat and electricity. The landfill gas cannot be allowed to build up in the landfill because of the risk of explosion. More than 7 million tons of trash buried at the landfill. That trash currently generates 2,700 standard cubic feet per minute of landfill gas and will increase. Flaring the gas releases greenhouse gases to no purpose.

In 1998 the County formed a partnership with Fortistar to install a landfill gas collection system and a 1.9 MW energy recover facility which is a two engine turbine that burns the gas to make electricity that is sold to NOVEC, the local electric cooperative. The 1.9 MW energy recovery system is currently operational, but the amount of landfill gas generated has increased from 1600 scfm in 1999, to the current amount of 2600 scfm, and is utilizing less than 25% of the currently available landfill gas for energy recovery. Three (3) additional turbine engines are scheduled to be installed by August 2013 to produce additional 4.8 MW of electricity. Additional gas will be available even after the new engines are installed and will provide landfill gas to heat the Fleet Maintenance Building and provide fuel to the Animal Shelter through a new gas pipeline. The landfill is moving forward to develop plans to create an “ECO Park” at the landfill.

The Piedmont Environmental Council (PEC) located in Warrenton received their award for their land conservation work combining public and private initiatives with market-based solutions to achieve regional conservation goals. Heather Richards, accepted the award on behalf of the Piedmont Environmental Council and said, “We are honored to be recognized for over 40 years of work in preserving the scenic, cultural, and natural resources of the Piedmont. The need for land conservation remains strong throughout our region and all of Virginia, and we look forward to continuing our partnership with landowners and the community to protect the landscape that makes this place special to us all.”

PEC staff work with landowners bringing a holistic approach to land conservation. They see the decisions of individual landowners to protect their land in a larger, collective context. PEC reaches out to landowners to raise the idea of land conservation and meeting with those who are interested in conserving their land bringing experience and knowledge to help the landowners through the process. As an accredited land trust, they also hold conservation easements directly. PEC currently holds 47 easements -- protecting over 6,600 acres in our region.

I know PEC through their Sustainable Habitat Program. PEC works with landowners throughout the region on land management strategies to improve wildlife habitat and water quality. PEC works to educate all types of landowners about our region’s crucial ecosystems and the small and large steps we can all take to protect our wildlife corridors and watershed. PEC staff stays up to date with local, state and federal policy regarding land conservation. This year, PEC played a major role in writing and introducing a bill in the Virginia General Assembly, HB 1398, which protects and expands the tools available for helping landowners conserve their land in perpetuity. The bill passed with board bi-partisan support.

Photo of native plant and grasses in Loudoun is by Katherine Vance

Also receiving a Gold Medal Award was Virginia Tech for its Sustainability Program, with four components targeting improving the efficiency of facilities and operations, enhancing academic programs related to sustainability, engaging the larger community, and changing campus culture and behavior to conserve energy, water and materials. (Green Risks supplies content for the Extension newsletter published at Virginia Tech.)

Recycling and Trash

If we are to live sustainably on this earth we need to think beyond our carbon footprint and try to reduce our wasting of the Earth’s natural resources and our own resources. In 2009, Americans generated about 243 million tons of trash and recycled and composted 33.8% of this trash (or 82 million tons) mostly through curb side recycling services. On average, Americans recycled and composted 1.46 pounds of our individual waste generation of 4.34 pounds per person per day. According to Scott MacDonald, Recycling Program Manager of the Prince William County Landfill, we in Prince William County Virginia generate 5.65 pounds of trash per person per day and only recycle about 32%. Much of this trash could have been reused or recycled or in many instances not purchased in the first place.

We need to reduce our waste. Our trash, or municipal solid waste as it is more properly called, is made up the things we buy and then throw away. Our household and commercial waste includes paper (magazines, newspapers, advertising, computer print outs) packaging, food scraps, grass clippings, sofas, computers, old tires, broken electronics and appliances, old clothes, broken dishes, and old appliances. Municipal solid waste does not include industrial, hazardous, or construction waste (except small builder or homeowner construction waste). As the population grows we have been generating more and more waste, but we have also increased the waste generated per person from an average of 2.68 pounds per person in 1960 to the current level of 4.34 pounds per person, a 61% increase. The peak average per person trash generation was in 2000 when the United States generated on average 4.72 pounds of trash per person. It is to be noted that the recycling rate went from 0% in 1960 to almost 34% in 2009. The EPA and lots of other groups has a list of suggestions to reduce the amount of trash that we produce, read it, some of the suggestions are simple painless steps, others will save you money. See what changes you can make.

The EPA estimates that residential waste (including waste from apartment houses) to be 55% to 65% of total trash generation. Waste from commercial and institutional locations, such as schools, hospitals, and businesses, accounted for 35% to 45% of total waste. Mr. MacDonald could only speculate why the trash generation per person in Prince William County exceeded the national averages. He thought it might be because we are an affluent community, but there could be demographic or cultural causes that produces the higher generation rate here. Whatever the reason, we need to improve both in total trash generation and the percentage of trash recycled. We need to move away from the disposable, single serving container behaviors and reduce, reuse and recycle. Really.

More than 77% of the typical waste can be recycled. According to the EPA the municipal solid waste typically consists of 28% Paper and paperboard, 28% is yard trimmings and food scraps (which can all be composed and really should not be buried in the landfill), 12% Plastics, 9% Metals; 8% rubber, leather, and textiles, 7% Wood, 5% glass and 4% Other miscellaneous wastes. Mr. MacDonald believes that the make up of the Prince William municipal solid waste is probably very similar to the national averages, but no analysis has ever been done.

The Prince William Landfill on Dumfries Road provides areas for depositing reusable items like clothing, furniture and functioning (and non functioning) appliances. In the front area of the landfill are Tire Recycling containers for disposing of used tires. These tires are ground up and used as cover for the land filling operation. There are also Scrap Metal Recycling containers for recycling metal items such as appliances, auto parts, bicycles, swing sets, mowers (with all the fluids removed), metal pipe, metal fixtures, metal siding, chain, microwave ovens, sheet metal, tire rims, chain link fencing, cable, and other similar metal items. Recovered metal is often sent overseas where the manufacturing of such items actually takes place. Refrigerators, freezers, air conditioners and other Freon containing appliances must be placed in a special designated area so that the Freon can be removed and properly disposed of or recycled depending on the age and type of the coolant fluid. There is an area for bottles and cans, mixed paper, newspapers, magazines, corrugated cardboard, and Special Waste Recycling for hazardous household waste requiring special handling (motor oil, oil filters, anti-freeze, car batteries, florescent light bulbs and household batteries). There is an area for Yard Waste/Brush containers for grass and leaves and brush recycling these materials will be turned into mulch or compost. Finally, there is a great place to leave items that still have usable life like used furniture, the Too Good to Waste Place. This is a great way to give away household items. Of course there is a regular Trash Disposal area with large containers for disposing of non-recyclable waste.

Many residents have trash pick up service with curb side recycling. The curb side recycling is also call single stream recycling because all recyclable waste is mixed together in one collection container at the curb. In some places the newspapers are separately recycled (and my husband still likes to separate the newspapers). The commingled recycling is then hauled away to a recycling center (not the landfill) that is equipped to process and separate recycling that is single streamed. The materials are then sorted by the type of recyclables. In Prince William, Fairfax, and Loudoun counties the recyclables are hauled from our curbs to a Waste Management single stream recycling facility in the region where the recyclables are separated and processed. As Waste Management has expanded its capabilities more and more types of materials are now acceptable. Waste Management has expanded it capabilities and shortly your trash collector will be able to collect newspapers, magazines and catalogs as well as other types of paper, paperboard packaging, cardboard, plastic containers #1 through #7 narrow neck and wide mouth containers and tubs, metal food and beverage cans, spray cans (no hazardous substances), aluminum foil wrap and pie pans with food residue removed and balled up. Milk, juice and soup cartons (without the plastic caps and straws) and glass bottles and jars. The expansion in items acceptable for recycling should be in place shortly and we can all expand our recycling.