Loading ...A paper in the Journal of Finance recently appeared titled ‘Asset Pricing with Garbage’, making the argument that solid waste volumes can be used to measure consumption. The paper makes the case that ‘garbage data’ tracks stock performance ‘twice as well’ as the governments data on consumption. See a summary of the article here: LINK
The Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation will conduct a public hearing on the draft language for the proposed waste reduction rule on September 1, 2009 on the 17th floor of the L & C Tower in Nashville. The hearing will be from 9:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m. It will also be broadcast via GoToMeeting in a Webinar format to allow citizens Internet accessibility to the proceedings.
The public comment period is active and will end September 30, 2009. All comments must be received by 4:30 p.m. on September 30th to be considered.
Additional information can be found at: http://state.tn.us/environment/swm/wrpublic.shtml
You can register for the Webinar by following the link below.
California is known for it’s ambitious waste reduction goals. We noticed that they have moved back to a measurement strategy that looks at disposal rather than diversion.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has signed into law Senate Bill 1016, legislation by State Senator Patricia Wiggins (D-Santa Rosa) that shifts the focus, from 50-percent diversion to 50-percent disposal reduction, of the current requirement that a local jurisdiction reduce its solid waste disposal over what it would have been given local growth factors.”
According to the CIWMB, Wiggins noted, “California diverted more than 46 million tons of solid waste away from landfills into recycling, composting and transformation programs in 2005, for an estimated statewide diversion rate of 52 percent. Diversion has increased nine-fold since the Integrated Waste Management Act was passed in 1989.”
Wiggins added that her bill is “intended to focus on disposal reduction and enhanced program implementation efforts.”
According to CIWMB, the benefits of moving to a disposal-based system include: increases timeliness and accuracy; streamlines review by allowing jurisdictions that are in compliance to be reviewed every four years instead of every two; and, maintains allowances for rural jurisdictions. See the link to this article here.
The 2007-2008 Annual Report to the Governor and General Assembly on the Solid Waste Management Act is available for review at this link:
http://www.tn.gov/environment/swm/pdf/0708GovRpt.pdf
This document provides a nice overview of the state’s goals and accomplishments in the past fiscal year. The document lists where we are as a state with regard to waste disposal and waste reduction and highlights solid waste assistance projects undertaken by the division.
–Forwarded by Larry Christley, TDEC Division of Solid Waste Management–
On February 3, 2009, the Tennessee Solid Waste Disposal Control Board (SWDCB) heard a presentation by Glen Pugh, Manager of the Solid Waste Programs, on the draft waste reduction rules. At this presentation, the SWDCB was requested to approve sending the draft rules out for public comment. However, after some discussion a vote was taken on whether to send the draft rules on to public comment. The result of the vote ended in a tie, failing to approve sending the draft rules forward. A motion was made to table the draft rules until the June meeting of the Board. This motion passed with a provision that the Solid Waste Advisory Committee review the draft language and see if the rules could be streamlined or broken into sections for future considerations taking into account current economic and infrastructure concerns prior to returning to the disposal control board.
A week later on February 10th, the Solid Waste Advisory Committee (SWAC) met and was presented the draft rule language from the concepts that were sent forward nearly six months earlier. After some discussion, the SWAC agreed to take a closer look at the draft language, talking with their constituents if needed to identify specific points that the Department might consider amending before returning to the disposal control board in June. The SWAC will meet again on April 14th to share their recommendations to the Department on how best to proceed with the draft rule language.
If additional information is needed or you would like to follow the progress of this rule package, please visit: www.TDEC.net/swm/prwr/taskforce.shtml for the most up to date information.
You may receive “Governing” Magazine in your office. This is a great magazine and they also have a great online resource for local governments interested in benchmarking.
Check out ENVIRONMENTAL data compiled by Governing Magazine. This includes info on Superfund, Air Quality, TRI, Alternative Fuels, Drinking Water, State Environmental Spending, and Municipal Waste Management. The site also looks nationwide at issues related to infrastructure, health, finance, public safety, and information technologies.
See the resource center link here.
Ever wonder how Tennessee stacks up against other states? This Columbia University Waste map shows the results for each of the States, as reported by Biocycle magazine in their 2004 survey.
Use your mouse to ‘roll over’ each state. A pop up table shows compiled numbers for waste disposal and generation, tons generated per capita, and the state’s calculated recycling rate.
I ran across this worksheet for conducting an on site/in-house waste audit. Along with the worksheet, there are useful conversion tables for common commercial and residential waste streams. You can download the worksheet at this link:
Forwarded from Bob Knight, Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation
This is a reminder that the dates originally scheduled for public rulemaking hearings on proposed changes to the Solid Waste Management Act, and related rules and regulations, have been cancelled. Public hearings on these changes, recommended by the Solid Waste Task Force and approved by the Solid Waste Advisory Committee, were scheduled for November 19 in Knoxville, November 20 in Nashville, and December 3 in Jackson.
It is very likely that the Solid Waste Disposal Control Board will reschedule these hearings at a special called meeting in early 2009. Dates for those meetings will be posted on the department’s web site at http://www.state.tn.us/environment/swmh/ppo/.
If you have any questions, please contact Mr. Larry Christley at (615) 532-0744 or e-mail him at larry.christley@state.tn.us
–forwarded by Louis Bordenave–
STATE RELEASES RECYCLING JOBS STUDY
RALEIGH- North Carolina recycling businesses continue an upward growth trend, according to a newly released study by the Division of Pollution Prevention and Environmental Assistance’s Recycling Business Assistance Center.
The study’s major findings include:
N.C. supports 14,490 private sector recycling-related jobs
* Private sector recycling jobs have increased 13.4 percent since 2003
* N.C. recycling businesses support an annual payroll of $376,890,000
* Forty-five percent of recycling businesses surveyed anticipate creating more jobs over the next two years
* Thirty-nine percent of businesses surveyed report manufacturing a product using recycled materials
* Recycling businesses target a wide variety of recyclables for collection, processing or utilization in manufacturing; no single recycling commodity dominates the market
The study is a follow-up to previous studies conducted in 1994, 2000 and 2004. North Carolina-based recycling businesses listed in the state’s free, online Recycling Markets Directory (http://www.p2pays.org/dmrm/start.aspx) received an invitation to participate in the 2008 Recycling Business employment study update.
Additional recycling employment data from the N.C. Employment Security Commission and Harris Infosource was included in the study for recycling-related businesses not listed in the Recycling Markets Directory.
A copy of the study can be found online at http://www.p2pays.org/ref/46/45998.pdf.
For more information about the study, contact Sherry Yarkosky, (919) 715-6511 or sherry.yarkosky@ncmail.net.
N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources
