Whatever your views on the future of municipal waste management on Grand Cayman I think everyone can agree that the present George Town landfill site is an environmental disgrace and that those responsible in the present and past governments along with the senior management of the DEH have let this country down badly over the last 20 years by allowing the bad practices that created the mess to continue.
We should also be grateful to the Dart Corporation, whatever its motives may be, for offering to remediate it. I have no doubt with their excellent environmental recycling philosophy in the US that they would do an outstanding job here as well, especially as they are the closest major neighbour of the landfill site and therefore have the most to lose if it is not done correctly. If they want to build their own waste to energy plant to use the vented gases then they should be allowed to – better these are converted to carbon dioxide than vent uninhibited to the atmosphere as environmentally damaging methane.
I am opposed to all future unsorted landfill sites, no matter where they are on Island, as this is a low lying island, which is at great risk from the global effects of climate change due to rising sea levels and increased ambient air temperatures. We should therefore be setting an example to the rest of the world how to combat this issue rather than becoming an even bigger part of it. Unsorted landfill produces a mixture of gases, some which create a bad smell causing the SMB issue, but more importantly they produce methane, which is seven times more active than carbon dioxide as a green house gas.
If mankind does not deal with the current levels of greenhouse gases being emitted, the trapped solar heat will continue to melt the ice and sea water will rise. All development and trade on this Island will be affected. Remember, Cayman is a coral island and it was once at the bottom of the sea so there is no reason to believe it could not be again. If predictions are correct we could see a 12-inch rise in sea levels in Grand Cayman in the next 30 years and that is potential very serious.
I wish to thank all the bloggers who posted after my last letter, no matter what your opinion was, as these raised some issues that I had previously overlooked regarding the GT landfill.
The main issues raised about the whole issue of past and future landfills were the following:
NIMBYism
The smell of landfill gases on SMB
The capital cost of WTE mass burn plants
The recurrent operating costs of trucking to Breakers from GT-WB corridor
Dangers to health and environment of unsorted landfills – lined or not
Health and environmental danger from the present site and the new proposed site
Explosions in all landfills
DEH and government record of poor management of GT landfill
Lack of space that GT landfill for unsorted land filling
Proposed new landfill site in BT
Increased tax revenue to pay for future waste management
Poor image for tourism
I also believe, whatever your views are, we all want to see a positive solution to this issue quickly so the Island can move on, but in the knowledge that in 20 years time we don’t have the same issue again. That is why I believe that we should try to eliminate as much of the waste from the current landfill as possible and turn future waste management on this Island from a national debt into new revenue streams and job creation opportunities for Caymanians and residents of this Island.
The first operation would be to educate all the residents of Grand Cayman about the reduce, reuse and recycle philosophy as well as sorting the household waste into organic (the smelly stuff) and recyclable waste. After the initiative of the removal of non-biodegradable plastic shopping bags by supermarkets, I see no obstacles to all residents learning how to do this but perhaps a monetary penalty system would have to be introduced to help people who continue not to sort their waste or, as in the UK, if you don’t get it right, they just don’t collect your garbage until you do. Being left with a pile of stinky garbage outside your house for a few weeks should be a good incentive for change.
To resolve the NIMBY issue I would propose setting up recycling centres in every district in Cayman. Following the UK system, these centres are basically a designated area with an engineered hard standing with drain that collects the runoff for proper treatment. Separate dumpsters are set up to collect materials to be recycled – glass, paper, metals, plastics, garden waste, building waste, used car oil, batteries etc. The public separates its recyclable waste into dumpsters for each material. Each of these centres would be leased by DEH to private operators for a fee and the private firms would recycle the materials and sell the recovered material to make a profit thus creating much needed job opportunities for Caymanians and creating revenue instead of debt. Any materials unable to be recycled would need to be disposed of as a part of the contract and the most effective way would be with an air curtain furnace, which cost about $100,000 to purchase and few dollars a day to run. It burns material at 1600 C without any smoke or fumes and reduces the contents to about 4-10 per cent ash, which would be sent to landfill. It should be noted that recyclable material generally does not smell, hence is not a nuisance to neighbouring property. The first lease period would for a double duration at a peppercorn rate to allow operators to create markets for their products and then future leases would be let to the highest bidder thus becoming a revenue stream for the government.
The remaining waste, being organic in nature plus waste paper, could still be collected by the DEH or a leased private operator from households and commercial businesses to be taken to the GT landfill area to be processed into compost. This central location still remains the most viable location for the landfill as the majority of waste produced is concentrated within, say, a 10 mile radius miles of George Town and therefore the fuel costs for running the garbage trucks to and fro will be much less than if the landfill was repositioned all the way out past Bodden Town in Breakers. With the price of fuel ever on the increase, this recurrent cost must be a major factor taken into consideration in discussions dealing with any new position for a land fill. By retaining the land fill at George Town, Dart Corporation will be saved millions by not having to develop the BT landfill site and it will also keep Bodden Town and its surrounding population happy.
But what are the benefits of keeping the GT landfill where it is? Firstly, to remediate the existing site DART is going to need a two to three foot covering of top soil or compost and by treating the future organic (compostable) waste at this location the transportation cost of the material is eliminated because they will be using what they produce. In addition, the government can sell their processed waste to DART, landscaping companies or farmers to improve their soil conditions; hence it also becomes a revenue stream from the operation and therefore goes towards reducing the government’s annual expenditure and deficit.
The process would involve using an ‘in-vessel’ composting system, which is designed for sites that have both space limitations and are smell sensitive as this system produces no smell during the composting process. The waste arrives on site and is dumped into a hopper and then shredded while still fresh and fed via conveyer belts into the in-vessel composters. Within a week, heat treated compost is produced, which is safe to use as soil or soil improvement material. The cost of a 96 ton in-vessel composter manufactured in Texas and delivered to Mobile, Alabama, for shipping to Cayman is around $200,000. The grinding equipment is also around that figure. If an anaerobic digester was used instead, the cost would be several millions in capital cost but this would be offset by the electricity that could be produced from the waste gas from the process. An added benefit is that the sludge from the wastewater plant could be also processed in the same system. The end products, bio-compost and electricity, could both be sold and create new revenue streams for Government.
Both these methods cost considerably less than the $100M capital cost bandied around by people when they talk about waste-to-energy plants and would also remove all organic waste from the landfill. One could therefore extend the life of the current landfill another half century or so by continuing the landfill process on the unused portion of landfill as the only future material that would be added would be high temperature burnt ash from the curtain burners which would take up a fraction of the space of raw, unprocessed garbage. The added benefit would be that the landfill would consist of this inert ash and could be used in the future without fear of explosion for reclaimed land without any environmental or human health issues, thus no impact for DART. As an alternative to adding it to the landfill, this inert ash could be combined with the compost also to improve soil conditions this eliminating completely the need for landfill.
The spinoff of the composting method would be enrichment of soil and increased productivity for Cayman agriculture. This would give our Island increased food security, reduce our foreign import and create more local jobs in farming. More money would therefore stay in the local community instead of paying for imported food; there is a better quality of food due to freshness, there is a reduction in food miles/carbon footprint and no long term landfill problem for our future generations. We could promote this holistic approach to the tourism market and enhance the Cayman image and set a good example to the rest of the world for free.
Sam Small
Related Videos
