EDITORIAL Nation’s waste disposal practices are appalling Three-year old congressionally inspired program to upgrade U.S. solid waste disposal practices seems to have come to life
l n d u s t r y and people in the U.S. generate close to 175 million tons of solid wastes per year -nearly five pounds per person per day. This material must be disposed of in some way: open dumps, sanitary landfills, incinerators, burial at sea, and the like. The most common method of disposal is the open dump, But demand for living space near cities, along with public abhorrence of the odors, flies, and vermin associated with open dumps, has led to increased emphasis on sanitary landfills. Such landfills can be located near cities because sanitary, nuisancefree operation is not generally objectionable, at least when the public is properly informed and conditioned. However, the space problem persists. Only a limited amount of land near large cities is available for such purposes, so solid wastes must be disposed of farther from town at greater hauling cost. The Solid Waste Disposal Act of 1965 was the Congressional response to the observation that “no more obvious and disgraceful illustration of the need for applied technology can be found than the appalling state in which the nation’s waste disposal practices exist.” The act called for a national R&D program to find and perfect methods of disposal that would avoid environmental contamination. Congress also provided grant support for planning and demonstration programs at local, state, and interstate levels. Last month, in a summary statement on 66 active demonstration projects being assisted by the Solid Wastes Program of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Richard D. Vaughn, chief of the program, said that all 66 projects “are aimed at solving the nation’s alarming solid wastes problem through innovation in waste disposal or through regional approaches to waste management. Successful efforts can mean a cleaner, healthier, more pleasant environment for all Americans.”
One of the grant awards made last month went to the city of Cleveland to study the possibility of forming municipal wastes into bricks that will be used “to reclaim submerged lands adjacent to Lake Erie.” According to the announcement, shredded waste materials will be mixed with fly ash, dried sewage sludge, river and lake dredgings, and incinerator residue, and compressed into brick shapes. Tests will be made to insure that the bricks do not aggravate Lake Erie’s severe pollution problem. Other new programs include the following: * Demonstration of sanitary landfills in rural counties. Studies on blending of refuse with coal for use in coal-fired boilers. Observations on the use of disposable plastic or paper sacks for collection of solid wastes, both industrial and municipal, Development of programs to train technicians in solid wastes management. * Evaluation of air pollution control devices for incineration equipment. Demonstration of the effectiveness of area commissions to deal with probDelems of solid waste collection and disposal. velopment of a solid waste disposal plan for a large n-etropolitan area. Development of an economical plan for handling discarded large metal objects. Research aimed at reducing the water content of limestone sludge and finding better means than land deposit for its disposal. Evolution of new solid waste handling systems for multistory buildings. The matter of solid waste disposal has continually plagued mankind. Past societies have simply found a large hole in the ground or a large empty area, and built a mound of the cast off shards of civilization. While such dumps have proved invaluable to archaeologists in their understanding of ancient societies, they are a troublesome problem for current city dwellers. Some of the new R&D approaches described by Vaughn offer new hope for the solution of a long-time problem.
Volume 2, Number 11, November 1968 989
