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About The independent. (Vernonia, Or.) 1986-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 17, 2009)
The INDEPENDENT, September 17, 2009 Page 5 Oregon’s recycling habits result in “significant energy savings” In the midst of a sluggish economy, Oregonians’ persist- ence in following their recycling ethic is translating to significant energy savings and green- house gas reductions, accord- ing to the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality’s (DEQ) 2008 Oregon Material Recovery and Waste Genera- tion Rates Report. The material recovery rate includes recy- cling, composting and material burned for energy recovery. “When people recycle mate- rials, industry is able to make new products with significantly less energy and lower green- house gas emissions,” said Mary Lou Perry, DEQ solid waste specialist and report co- ordinator. “People who recycle really make a difference. They should be heartened by the positive effect that recycling has on the environment.” The DEQ report estimated an energy savings in 2008 from recycling equivalent to 243 mil- lion gallons of gasoline – roughly 2.7 percent of total en- ergy used by all sectors of the state’s economy. Greenhouse gas reductions in 2008 from re- cycling, composting and energy recovery amounted to the equivalent of eliminating tail- pipe emissions from 660,000 passenger cars, or roughly 4.6 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions in the state during 2008. Other significant findings from the report, which is avail- able on the DEQ website at http://www.deq.state.or.us/lq/s w/recovery/materialrecovery.ht m: • The state’s overall rate for recovering municipal solid waste in 2008 stood at 48.2 percent – an increase over 2007’s rate of 46.5 percent. • Oregonians’ per-capita waste generation (the sum of all discards, both recovered and disposed) in 2008 was 2,761 pounds, down signifi- cantly from the 3,045 pounds per person in 2007. • Twenty-seven of Oregon’s 35 individual wastesheds – comprised of individual coun- ties, the tri-county Portland metropolitan area and the city of Milton-Freewater – showed increases in their recovery rates from 2008 over 2007. A full listing of material recovery rates statewide is available on- line at: http://www.deq.state.or. us/lq/sw/recovery/materialre- covery.htm. Scroll down to “Rates (Wastesheds).” • Each wasteshed has a re- EPA settles with Columbia County firm for $89,000 The Environmental Protec- tion Agency reached a settle- ment with Dyno Nobel, Inc., for its alleged failure to report the release of about 448 pounds of ammonia from Dyno Nobel’s Deer Island facility in a timely manner. EPA announced Sep- tember 8 that the settlement in- cludes $17,000 in penalties and $72,000 to provide emer- gency response equipment for local firefighters and a new am- monia monitoring system. The settlement is related to a release at Dyno Nobel’s am- monia and nitric acid manufac- turing facility located at 63149 Columbia River Highway, Deer Island, on September 29, 2008. In the agreement, EPA al- leges that Dyno Nobel failed to notify the appropriate emer- gency response entities until approximately 11 hours after the release occurred. The fed- eral Comprehensive Environ- mental Response, Compensa- tion and Liability Act and the Emergency Planning and Com- munity Right-to-Know Act re- quire that releases of haz- ardous substances such as ammonia that are above a re- portable quantity be immedi- ately reported to federal, state and local emergency response entities. “The health and safety of our communities depends on prompt release reporting,” said Edward Kowalski, Director of EPA’s Office of Compliance & Enforcement in Seattle. “Effec- tive emergency response be- gins with timely notification, which allows local, state and federal responders to take ac- tion and reduce risks to public safety and the environment. Ammonia can be extremely dangerous, which is why imme- diately notifying the appropriate agencies is so important.” In addition to the penalty payment, Dyno Nobel will per- form a Supplemental Environ- mental Project, with $56,000 for an ammonia monitoring sys- tem for improved leak detec- tion. They will also provide over $16,000 to purchase emer- gency response equipment for Columbia River Fire & Rescue to improve the Department’s ability to respond to hazardous materials emergencies. Ammonia is a colorless gas that can cause severe burns to skin, eyes, throat and lungs, and, with high enough expo- sure, death. WOEC: Members ask about alternative power, more From page 1 building a new Vernonia sub- station above the flood plain. The new rate will take effect October 1, 2009. Most of the increase was ne- cessitated by a seven percent increase in the wholesale pow- er rate from Bonneville Power Administration, which supplies most of the energy used in WOEC’s system. Farmer also said that one-third of WOEC payments go to fish survival. About 50 members attended the rate hearing, asking about alternative power sources, par- ticularly wind power, and why WOEC’s rates are higher than other co-ops in the state. At this time, wind power costs $50 to $80 per megawatt, and hydropower costs about $30 per mw, explained financial consultant Royce Hagelstein, who was formerly Chief Finan- cial Officer for WOEC and is now Director of Accounting & Finance for Cowlitz PUD. Farmer explained that a lack of large commercial or industri- al accounts, which pay higher rates, forces costs onto resi- dential users. Other questions included the possibility of splitting WOEC’s 1224 square mile territory into other utilities. Because all members must be treated equally, this would require that the entire co-op be absorbed by other utilities at the same time, additionally, each of the other utilities would have to convince the state Public Utili- ties Commission that such a move would benefit their exist- ing rate payers. covery goal for 2009. Those rates will be known a year from now when the next report comes out, but in 2008, 20 of the wastesheds were already meeting their goal. This is the state’s 17th annu- al material recovery report, compiled via statistical surveys filled out by garbage haulers, private recycling and compost- ing companies, material recov- ery facilities, mills, transfer cen- ters, landfills and other facili- ties. DEQ uses a complex mod- el to analyze the recovered ton- nage of different materials and estimate the resulting green- house gas and energy savings. DEQ calculates the state’s material recovery rate by taking the total amount of material re- covered and dividing it by the total post-consumer material generated – the sum of all dis- cards that are either disposed of or recovered. In 2008, the state recovered 2,330,509 tons, or 48.2 percent of the to- tal municipal waste stream for the year. The state disposed of 2,903,138 tons, and that amount added with total materi- al recovered equals 5.23 mil- lion tons generated in 2008. This is an 8.2 percent decrease in waste generation from 2007. Among the materials recov- ered in 2008, paper represent- ed one third (33 percent), fol- lowed by yard debris (21 per- cent), metals (17 percent), wood waste (16 percent), glass (4 percent), plastic (2 percent), electronics (1 percent) and “other” (6 percent).
