Sludge Watch ==> Michigan Landfill pays ~$100, 000 fines for stinky Toronto sludge

[Maureen Reilly]

Sludgewatch Admin:

The City of Toronto hired Terratec (better known as 'American Water') to 
haul away its extra stinky sewage sludge.  But farmers in Ontario are loath 
to take sludge, and there is an abundance of manure to coat Ontario fields.  
Under the arrangement with Terratec the City paid out more money to have 
Terratec haul to US landfills than they paid for farm application.  So for 
years the City staff told the public that Toronto sludge went to 
'beneficial' use on farmlands while 98% of the sludge was quietly hauled 
into a Michigan landfill - to the disgust of the Michigan landfill 
neighbours.

Sludge into a landfill needs to be treated carefully.  Generally the 
stinkier sludges need the landfill to dig a hole, put in some trash to 
'hold' the sludge' and then add the sludge and cover it up.  The ratio of 
sludge to trash needs to be about 4-1 to 7-1 trash to sludge ratio to stop 
the sludge from 'moving'.  Essentially the sludge will ooze toward low 
points in the landfill.

Wave after wave of affronted Ontario rural residents have been appalled by 
the dreadful stench of Toronto sludge.  There are some lawsuits still before 
the courts. Now add Michigan residents to the long list of the long 
suffering.

The City of Toronto has been doing research to try to understand why the 
stink of Toronto sludge is so appalling.  However they refuse to respect 
Freedom of Information requests for copies of the reports.  It looks like 
Toronto sludge - which did not meet even the 2 million fecal coliform per 
gram pathogen levels for years - may be one of those sludges with pathogen 
reactivation.

You remember pathogen reactivation?  It is the reports on how many 
centrifuge dewatered sludges find that that fecal coliform and Ecoli counts 
go up six decimal places in 15 minutes after centrifudging.  It looks like 
sludge digestion doesn't kill off the bacteria, just puts them into a viable 
non-culturable state.

So where is Toronto sludge going now?  Still a state secret apparently.  
Most of it is going to a landfill in New York state, I understand, and the 
rest is going to Quebec.

To the west of Toronto are the new expanded Brampton sludge fluidized beds.  
In the east end of Toronto is the Highland Creek sewage sludge 
incinerator...and the sludge from York County north of Toronto all goes to 
the sludge incinerators in Durham County.

Toronto City staff have been heavily lobbied by a group from the Beaches 
District to ship sludge out of Toronto.  Rural communities...and now 
American community groups...are very very unhappy that urbanites are 
imposing Toronto waste sludges into the rural hinterland.

The irony is that Toronto - like LA - likes to think of itself as all green, 
noble, and shiny.  When really they just truck their stench and pollution to 
the rural hinterland.  Toronto should be using modern Kyoto friendly 
technologies to manage sludge as energy rather than polluting the 
countryside, air, soil, water, and food chain.

For a video on various ways of using sludge for energy watch this video:

http://www.georgiastrait.org/CAW/video-waste-treatment.php


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Freep.com » News » Wayne County
Landfill settles Canadian waste case
June 27, 2007

FREE PRESS STAFF REPORT


The operator of a Michigan landfill that took human waste sludge from Canada 
has agreed to pay the state $94,000 in fines and $5,500 in cost 
reimbursements because the stinky sludge became unstable and spread beyond 
the landfill’s licensed area.

Republic Services, which operates the Carleton Farms landfill in western 
Wayne County, stopped taking the wastewater treatment sludge from Canada a 
year ago, said Bob McCann, spokesman for the Department of Environmental 
Quality. At the time, the goey muck made up about a third to a half of the 
volume of trash that went to the landfill, one of the biggest in Michigan. 
The gooey muck made the landfill unstable and caused some cracks, which let 
gases and odors escape, the DEQ said. Neighbors complained that they 
couldn’t use their own backyards in summer because of the stench. Republic 
built a clay buttress to stop the oozing waste and has promised to monitor 
the problem and build a cap to keep the muck from spreading further.


McCann said Canadian waste no longer comes to Michigan. Waste from Detroit, 
which also went to Carleton Farms, now goes to other landfills in Michigan.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070627/NEWS02/70627073/0/NEWS06