Yard Waste = regular trash?

[winterhill.livejournal.com]

After hauling my brown bags of sodden yard waste to the curb last night, having one of them break in the process,  and refilling the two big brown bags, I was sad to look out the window this morning as the trash guys tossed my regular garbage in the truck and then the CLEARLY MARKED bags of waste in after them.  I was not happy.  Called 311 and the very nice woman told me it must have been an error -- typically a separate truck comes around for the recyclable waste.  I asked her to log my call as a complaint in case the DPW can do something to monitor more closely.  I write here to ask you to keep an eye on your yard waste/trash collection too.  If they are throwing everything together where you live, please call 311 and report it.

Comments

[magg1es.livejournal.com]

That happened to someone on Francesca Ave. I was wondering about that.

[miraclaire.livejournal.com]

I have actually been pleasantly surprised that a non-regular-trash truck has regularly been picking up our yard waste.

[laryu.livejournal.com]

Usually, it's a separate truck that picks up our yard waste, much later in the day from regular collection. But our yard waste disappeared in the morning yesterday, which leads me to suspect the regular trash guys grabbed this week. I can't confirm that, however.

[veek.livejournal.com]

(Warning: coffee hasn't quite hit me yet, which is why my brain is off and running.)

I haven't noticed one way or another with yard waste, but will be on the lookout.

And then I thought: at the moment I'm definitely all for yard waste being recycled. But, given that it disintegrates relatively quickly, might it be beneficial to a landfill to have some amount of yard waste in with the rest of the trash? Would it have any effect on the overall disintegration process?

Or do they burn all trash these days? Sounds unlikely, but I dunno. How is trash handled in Somerville and the surrounding areas?

[cityofbeige.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't doubt incineration. This is common in high populated areas due to lack of land, and they heavily process the fumes so that there isn't a problem with dioxin, NOx, SO2, etc. leaking into the atmosphere. The net energy (ie: burning trash minus energy to process the gases) goes into generating electricity.

[anotherthink.livejournal.com]

That sounds so efficient! Is there a reason they wouldn't do this in less-populated areas?

[cityofbeige.livejournal.com]

That's a good question. Some of it has to do with NIMBYism, where no one wants to see huge facilities or smokestacks near their house... but then again, is a big trash pile more healthy or aesthetically pleasing? Also in the past 10-15 years there's been a bigger focus on landfill reclamation, or "garbage mining"... basically picking through the garbage to find usable materials. I suppose you need a bit of land to dump things on while you sort through it.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_meej_/]

My impression (which could easily be way wrong) was that even though it breaks down relatively quickly in the open air or proper composting conditions, even yard waste has a tough time when it's in a landfill environment - not enough water, air, light, microorganisms, etc get to it.

[miss-chance.livejournal.com]

I don't know if Som. landfills or incinerates, but I can tell you for certain that landfilling technology is about keeping trash from breaking down more than about having it disintegrate. The first step to making a landfill is to dig a big hole and then line it with about a solid inch of plastic. What they're working to prevent is household waste breaking down and the toxins running into the ground water. So the landfill is basically a swimming pool of toxic sludge, with gas-release pipes scattered through-out so that it doesn't explode where breaking down is happening. Eventually they decide the pile is done and cover it. The end. In a hundred years you could open it up and read the newspapers.

When you think of waste manangement from a public health standpoint, and about preventing slow-percolating disease vectors, modern incineration is not as bad a deal as it's set out to be, either. They can put serious scrubbers in the stacks, and recover some energy from the burning and it doesn't leave you a large plot of land festering that you can't use for anything else (nor the surrounding areas). I wouldn't be surprised if a modern municipal garbage incinerator put fewer toxins into the air than the collected residential bar-b-ques from that same municipality.

One cool thing they're doing these days, though, is segragating a few items that they don't really know how to effectively recycle now, into separate landfills, so that ten years from now, when there's a cost effective way to use large quatities of, say, LDPE, they can say "good! it's all over there, under that marker."

A really cool read on this topic is Rubbish! The Archaeology of Garbage, by Rathje and Cullen (http://www.portersquarebooks.com/NASApp/store/Product?s=showproduct&isbn=9780816521432). It was a real eye-opener for me.

[ayelle.livejournal.com]

thank you for that link! fascinating!

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

However, I heard that the ash from modern incinerators is still highly toxic, and still needs to be dumped somewhere.

[tt02144.livejournal.com]

I do know that when they began to require that yard waste be separated from regular trash, we were told that, due to a new law, it was illegal to dump yard waste with the regular waste.
I haven't been home to notice the pick ups lately, but often in the past I saw my recycling bins thrown in to the regular trash truck. This was pre-311 so the only recourse was a call to DPW (HA!).

[derekp.livejournal.com]

I see this often. I'd say at least 30% of the time. I also routinely see the recycle truck folks leave my cardboard which is neatly broken down, tied in 2'x2' bundles (this takes a LONG time after a trip to Ikea), and left under or beside my blue bin. I spend 30 minutes cutting the damn stuff up and it gets left for the trash guy.

[kjc.livejournal.com]

The only way anyone's going to DO anything about this is if you complain to the RIGHT people. I.e., call 311 like the OP did. Or call your Alderman(person).

It IS in fact illegal to put yard waste in regular garbage.

Our garbage is in a separate place from our yard waste which is in a separate place from our recycling. Our neighbors occasionally put their yard waste with ours since we put it out so consistently (thanks to my BF, The Gardener) that the Yard Waste Truck Guys look for it and often don't notice other bags on our side street.

So we rarely get the mix up with the regular garbage guys taking our yard waste or recycling as they'd have to go out of their way to do it.

Not that I'm recommending this for everyone, but something to keep in mind. Mainly, though, you should VOICE YOUR COMPLAINTS to people who listen and respond.