Rockland Landfill Closure and Transfer Station Reconfiguration

Posted June 22, 2017

Over ten years ago, the City of Rockland was plagued by odors emanating from the landfill. City Council agreed to look into the matter and hired CMA Engineering to evaluate what could be done to resolve the issue. Based on the CMA Engineering odor study, the recommendations were to accelerate the filling of the landfill and bring it to closure as soon as possible. Well, we are at that point where the landfill is almost full. The Public Services department, working with the Department of Environmental Protection, has been approved to for the State Reimbursement program that will pay for 75% of the costs of the landfill closure, the remaining 25% will be covered by the landfill closure account savings. In 2018-2019, we should expect to be at capacity in the landfill and be working on final closure plans for covering the landfill area with an engineered landfill cover system which will bring the era of landfill odors to an end. The other piece of the puzzle is what to do with the waste that used to go in the landfill? The answer is, we are going to do what almost all other communities do, create an area where the various waste items that used to go in the landfill can be placed. The segregated items will then be recycled or sent to another landfill. Another big change coming up is how we are going to collect our recyclable materials. In 2018, we will begin collecting all recyclable materials together in one to-be-determined location. The days of sorting paper, tin cans, plastic containers, and cardboard are over. Now we will collect recyclable materials in one bin and transport them to Eco Maine where a Mechanical Sorting Operation will use several mechanical technologies to sort the various recyclable types. We will be rolling out an aggressive recycling education campaign to help educate the public. Recycling will be much simpler.