[GreenYes] more on WTC - where is it going?

["Marjorie J. Clarke" <mclarke@shiva.hunter.cuny.edu>]

In response to Terri, though I don't know where the C&D from the WTC will 
eventually go, the FBI is paintakingly going through all of it for 
evidence.  They found the passport of one of the hijackers a few blocks 
from ground zero.  Considering the careful sort it is getting, I can't see 
how it is infeasible to place metals in separate piles from everything 
else.  As for biohazard, I wouldn't think this to be an issue, since when 
metals are recycled they are melted at extremely high temperatures, many 
times in excess of what would be needed to destroy any biohazard.  Much of 
the metal is in huge pieces that only a crane can lift.

Another question that has occurred to the solid waste advisory community 
here in NYC is... where is the rest of our 40,000 tons per day? of garbage 
going during this period?  We know it's being collected.  For a while, all 
of the bridges and tunnels from Manhattan to Brooklyn and to New Jersey 
were closed.  This is significant, since during the "interim Fresh Kills 
landfill closure plan" where the marine transfer system (barges to Fresh 
Kills) is not being used, all the waste has been exported on trucks.  The 
Holland tunnel, where some of waste was being trucked to the Newark 
incinerator, has remained closed.  Traffic has been a nightmare 
elsewhere.  Is it being stockpiled somewhere?  Has the marine transfer 
system been reactivated and everything is going to Fresh Kills?  No word yet.

(Incidentally, I use the term "waste" loosely, since the City targets about 
50% of our discards as being in our recycling program, but we only have a 
20% diversion rate, the other 30% -- which is 40% of the stuff we are 
exporting, is actually recyclables.  On top of this, 15% of our "waste" 
consists of food waste, almost none of which is composted.  The solid waste 
advisory boards - I'm vice chair of both the citywide and Manhattan's Board 
- have been quite critical that so much usable material is being exported 
while the budget for recycling is about 5% of the Sanitation dept's budget, 
and that for waste prevention is less than 1%.)

Maggie Clarke, Ph.D.
Environmental Scientist and Educator
http://everest.hunter.cuny.edu/~mclarke/index.htm
New York City 
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