John Trotti

Before you go diving into Elements 2004, let me tell you what I think makes this issue so special, not just relative to the rest of our issues during the year but in contrast with all previous Elements issues as well.

Yes, we've offered a Buyers Guide in the past, and yes, we've provided an overview of the many facets of integrated waste management. But here we're combining both print and electronic media in a way that adds a new dimension to this special presentation. The heart of Elements '04 lies in SWANA Executive Director John Skinner's white paper, "Pushing the Envelope on Waste Reduction and Recovery," an executive summary of the more detailed and comprehensive document that can be found in its entirety at www.forester.net/mw_elements04_reduction.html. The operative phrase here is "working document," and we're presenting it in this manner because we feel the discussion is too important to allow the issue to lie on a shelf gathering dust or be tossed into your recycling bin. We are counting on you to go through the working document critically and respond interactively by clicking on a "Comment on This" button you'll find in the left-hand margin. We will maintain a gallery of comments and responses on the Web site to help maintain the dialog.

As we've noted in previous Elements presentations, many of the most pressing challenges we face have little or nothing to do with waste'human resource issues, environmental regulations, public resistance to facilities and activities, and overextended municipal budgets where often as not waste winds up as a general fund donor.

Perhaps the most "at-risk" element of integrated solid waste management is diversion. The good news is that per-capita waste generation seems to have stabilized over the past several years, and while it's tempting to attribute this to heightened public awareness, you might want to factor in a depressed economy along with great improvements in product packaging before declaring victory. This is particularly important in assessing setbacks in recycling where apathy appears to have given way to a backlash against costly and marginally productive programs that show little promise of achieving the currently published diversion rates, much less the goals proposed for the future. Even aluminum-can recycling, where the benefits so obviously outstrip the costs, is showing a steady decline, an indicator that the staunchest champion of recycling cannot ignore.

It seems to me that there's a lesson to be learned from this, that contrary to the belief of some in the public-opinion-molding business, in the long run being anything less than forthcoming can be counterproductive. We saw it in the landfill space shortage scare tactics of the last decade, and now with recycling the public is becoming aware that there are real costs involved with less-than-obvious benefits for expenditures that have to be weighed in the light of other critical programs. Perhaps it's time to be more aggressive in making the public aware of waste management options and what their costs and benefits really are. Maybe in this way our program supporters will be more willing to stay the course.

The sad truth is that two-thirds of what continues to go to landfills is organic, and this does not even reflect the wink-wink use of composted MSW for substitute landfill cover, claiming that this is a reasonable approach to keeping organics out of landfills. Worse still is the waste of resources that could and should find a diversion market in the production of energy, fuels, or other bio-based products. But worst of all is the continuing efforts of some within the body of entrenched recycling interests to stymie entry of nontraditional technologies and approaches into the list of acceptable options.

Perhaps you have a different perspective, but from where I sit these challenges appear to be here for the duration, and before long we might look back to now as 'the good old days' in light of ever-increasing demands for attention to long-neglected urban infrastructure needs and overriding security concerns.

Surprising as it might seem, this last area'homeland security'might provide us with an opportunity to move beyond our custodial role into the practice of stewardship in combating growing concerns over the security of our various energy distribution networks. As outlined in our March/April 2003 Editor's Comments ("Energy Is a Terrible Thing to Waste," www.forester.net/mw_0303_editorial.html), the US Department of Energy is under mandate to "stimulate the creation and early adoption of technologies needed to make bioenergy cost-competitive in large markets." Not surprisingly, the federal government is the nation's single largest energy customer' $10 billion/year'with facilities and offices located in nearly every neighborhood throughout the country. In order to meet its mandate and counter security threats posed by terrorist activities, US DOE has focused its attention on landfill gas as the most promising widespread source of secure energy available. Let me rephrase this with emphasis to make certain it won't get lost in the shuffle: LFG stands at the head of the line when it comes to providing security from disruption of our nation's mainstream energy supply systems.

This is huge. For years LFGTE projects have languished in the shadow of more visible alternative energy resources, falling short of utility grid acceptance by a few cents per kilowatt-hour. But here the issue is not price competition in wholesale cost for use on the grid but, rather, security from grid outage. Nor is LFGTE the only waste activity with security-related value potential.

Once you allow yourself to think of waste-derived energy as a valuable component in security, you might consider what you can do to meet the highly critical and at-risk energy needs of your community with a portion of the resources that pass through your hands on a daily basis. It seems to me that those with their hands on the right resources in the right place in this day and age are looking at a seller's market.

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MSW - Elements 2004