County Plans To Burn Yard Waste In Lower Keys

The Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development entitled “Our Common Future” stated that humanity has the ability to make development sustainable by meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. The exploitation of resources, the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development, and institutional change should be made consistent with future as well as present needs.

In an effort to save the county money, the County Commission and its sustainability program manager Rhonda Haag have developed a plan to burn yard waste in the Lower Keys. Currently yard waste is trucked up to Broward County to be burned along with the rest of the trash from the Keys in Waste Management’s waste to energy plant.

While the plan has been couched, to a degree, in efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions the real motivation is financial. The demonstration project, originally scheduled to be voted upon at the December Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) meeting but pushed back to January because of concerns from people living near the proposed burning site, will cost the county $ 60 per ton versus $ 84 a ton now.

Burning yard waste came as somewhat of a surprise to the county’s Climate Action Committee (CCAC). As part of its recommendations to the county commission, the group hoped that the Keys would begin composting yard waste, a sustainable means for returning trees and shrubs to the earth. The resulting compost and mulch would be available to taxpayers.

According to Bill Hunter, CCAC member, the South Dade Soil and Water Conservation District offered to conduct a pilot program at the Key Largo transfer station to assess the cost and effectiveness of in-vessel composting of Key Largo yard waste. That method converts organic material to compost in as little as a few weeks, especially in a warm climate such as ours.

“Since the project would require the county to purchase composting equipment, commissioners encouraged staff to develop more comprehensive cost estimates,” Hunter wrote in an email. “The county mayor suggested waiting to include this proposal in a more comprehensive county-wide proposal for the disposal of all of solid waste. At its next meeting the CCAC passed a recommendation to the BOCC that the county proceed with the Conservation District pilot program. That recommendation as near as I can tell was never actually presented to the BOCC.”

Why? It’s an expensive process and the county wants to save money. Haag told the Blue Paper that vessel composting was “a little expensive.” Would the savings from burning accrue to taxpayers? Haag said that the project might head off tax increases on trash pickup but wouldn’t reduce that amount now.

It’s an odd proposal given that the county at least says that it wants to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The commissioners approved the plan presented by its Climate Action Committee. That plan says that “Monroe County, because of its unique vulnerabilities to sea-level rise and our international presence as a premier tourist destination, has an opportunity to demonstrate leadership on this global issue by implementing the critical policies, practices and investments that will eventually reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and prepare us for the unavoidable impacts of climate change. We clearly have the most to lose. If sea-level rise is not curtailed by immediate reductions in greenhouse gases, the Florida Keys may eventually become unlivable.”

It’s not just because of sea-level rise. As the oceans get more acidic coral reefs die. The phytoplankton at the bottom of the food chain would also disappear, damaging or destroying the seafood industry. Some also predict that hurricanes will get stronger as global warming intensifies.

The burning of yard waste presents serious challenges to reducing greenhouse gases. And the calculus needed to figure out which approach is best environmentally is very difficult because there are so many factors involved.

First, the Lower Keys currently have two trash/yard waste pickups and another for recycling. This would add an additional one with the associated trips by big diesel powered trucks. Second, all of the yard waste collected would first be taken to the county transfer station on Cudjoe and then a portion transported to Rudy Krause’s [the vendor who will do the burning] location on Ramrod. Third, the method for burning the green material – the self-refractory air curtain burner – uses diesel fuel to run its blowers and generates carbon dioxide from the resulting flames. The equipment’s manufacturer claims that the CO2 is less of a greenhouse gas problem than the black carbon generated by equipment used to grind yard waste into mulch.

So which is better? Or more accurately, which method is worse? A better way to look at the issue is to decide which is more sustainable, a word that has lost nearly all of its meaning through overuse and misuse.

Hunter commented that, “Listening to our county sustainability coordinator and county commissioners at the last BOCC meeting, it is clear that some feel that reducing cost (holding down rates/taxes) is an acceptable trade-off for in-county incineration.”

While burning yard waste here in the Keys may be cheaper, it is not sustainable. The diesel fuel to run the trucks and to accelerate the burn is not a sustainable resource because the oil it comes from is not being replaced in the ground. Using it up compromises“the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” because they won’t have this fuel when it has all been used up. Burning gasoline and diesel fuel are major contributors to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that makes the oceans more acidic and eventually kills coral.

Making a decision based on saving money illustrates the shortsightedness that will bring the result that the Climate Action Committee fears. As they say in their report, “We clearly have the most to lose.”