[Announce] Fred LeBrun's

Wed Jul 11 10:52:49 MDT 2007

Many of you probably read this article written by Fred LeBrun entitled "Has Albany's landfill stench been stifled? The nose knows" which was published in yesterday's Times Union newspaper.

  The title above is a link to the article and I have attached it to this email.

  I don't subscribe to the paper edition. I only read the online copy. 

  Without my having power yesterday, I first learned of this article from some comments made by earlier posters to the "Announce" list-serve, so I thank you for bringing it to my attention.

  I have nothing polite to say about this article, so I will not say anything. 

  You might say I'm fuming over it, but I promise you, I'm not emitting any aerosolized toxins!

  Maybe Freddy boy would like to spend a week camping atop Mt. Jennings in what used to be pristine pine barrens. 

  Just don't light a fire Fred, you just might wind up in Rensselaer if you do!

  I have also pasted the article below.

  Jim Travers

  -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Has Albany's landfill stench been stifled? The nose knows

First published: Tuesday, July 10, 2007

  Now that we're into the high heat and humidity of a Capital Region summer, it occurs to me there's something missing. 

  Where are the complaints about the awful stink from the city of Albany's Rapp Road landfill? 

  About this time last year and the year before, the city was getting 400 or more calls a month from deeply offended residents of the village of Colonie, Guilderland and even Albany. They were bitterly complaining about the persistent, stifling, gagging stench of rotten eggs billowing out of the landfill. 

  Could it be that after years of Albany promising to contain its gas, the landfill that serves 12 communities in the region has finally gone sweet on us? so. Even extreme critic and Colonie village Mayor Frank Leak is impressed. He is not only the official who's gotten the steadiest tattoo of complaints over the years, but he also lives near the landfill. During the worst of it, he could smell Rapp Road day and night, even in his dreams. 

  "Oh, yes, it's gotten a whole lot better. The city gave us a hot line number to call, which helped us chart complaints. In May, we had 200 to 300 calls. In early June we got 140 calls, and for the last three weeks we haven't gotten any." 

  The sweet smell of success, by any measure. 

  The secret, say Leak and Bill Bruce, Albany's general services commissioner, is covering about 15 acres of the landfill with a black plastic liner, to be followed by 24 inches of clay. That, and finally getting the landfill's internal piping working as it should for gas collection, and "flaring," or burning off more gas than used to be done. 

  Also, the landfill no longer accepts gypsum wallboard as refuse. 

  When acted on by anaerobic bacteria, the wallboard produced prodigious wafts of hydrogen sulfide. A former temporary cover designed to help matters is now believed to have actually contributed to the odor as well. the nose knows. And if the smell of rotten eggs was heavy in the air, we'd be hearing about it. 

  Although plenty of people out there remain deeply skeptical. 

  Attorney Peter Henner, working with Save the Pine Bush, is one of those. "We continue to investigate complaints. We're still not convinced it's abated." 

  The city, though, is heaving a cautious sigh of relief. The stink was a delicate issue and becoming a serious hindrance. 

  There was the not insignificant matter of a $50,000 fine from the state Department of Environmental Conservation for fouling the air, for one thing. The city will likely pay only about $7,500 of that fine, if it can make the remediation stick. 

  But more importantly, getting rid of that stench is critical to a forthcoming application from the city to expand the Rapp Road landfill by 10 or so acres, depending how you measure these things. 

  The DEC would be hard pressed to give the city a permit for temporary expansion right after heavily fining it, unless the smell went away. 

  Additionally, the city has hired a company called Applied Ecological Services to do massive habitat restoration for about 250 acres of the Pine Bush, again to answer critics. The city, which will spend $8 million to $10 million over a decade in these efforts, is working closely with the Pine Bush Commission. 

  Bruce says the city hopes to have a complete permit application for a landfill extension to the DEC by the end of the summer. 

  The expansion would be on top of the existing garbage pile, but also out to some extent along the east side of the landfill. "That would give us another six or seven years on top of the two to three that we still have at Rapp Road," he said. Another decade. a year ago, estimates for the current landfill were that it would be full by 2008, so these re-estimates are a note of optimism in an otherwise dismal symphony when it comes to the city and its landfill woes. 

  There are three semi-eternal truths about the city of Albany and garbage. 

  One, the city is addicted to the $13 million a year it collects from the other 11 communities in the ANSWERS consortium. That represents 10 percent of the city's budget revenues. Without that garbage money, fragile city finances would be thrown into chaos. 

  Two, Albany desperately needs more landfill space and soon, and that space is most likely to come from around the existing facility, which is smack dab in the middle of the environmentally sensitive Pine Bush. 

  And three, the permanent solution -- Albany's next Rapp Road -- is as elusive a butterfly as the Pine Bush's Karner blue. For 13 years, city officials have tried everything to create such a landfill in Coeymans, against plenty of local opposition. Now it seems, Coeymans may not be the most desirable place, anyway, says Bill Bruce. 

  At any rate, about the time the city has to update its solid waste management plan, a hard decision has to be made about what happens to Albany's future garbage. Bruce says that decision has to be made no later than next year, because a 10-year respite is not much, given how difficult it is to permit any sort of new landfill anywhere. 

  Bruce hinted that the solution may be in technology rather than geography. But that's tomorrow's headache. 

  For now, we'll just keep our fingers crossed the smell stays undercover. 

  Fred LeBrun can be reached at 454-5453 or by e-mail at flebrun at timesunion.com. 

  http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=604561&category=LEBRUN&BCCode=&newsdate=7/11/2007

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