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Re: [GreenYes] Clopyralid and Spokane
Santa Rosa moves to protect compost
Fearful of damaged plants from weedkiller, city won't
include yard waste in composting process
April 19, 2002
By MIKE McCOY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Santa Rosa's Board of Public Utilities on Thursday
barred yard waste
from the city's composting program for as long as two
years to protect the
compost from a weedkiller.
"I'm going to shut it down as soon as I get back to
the office," Mike
Reynolds, the city's biosolids coordinator, said upon
leaving the board's
meeting.
Yard waste will continue to be collected every two
weeks in the city, but
Santa Rosa will not use the grass clippings, leaves
and other organic
material collected in the 18,000 cubic yards of
compost it produces and
sells annually.
The decision was driven by the discovery of an
herbicide at various
Sonoma County composting facilities over the past two
months.
Clopyralid has been detected at levels up to 12 parts
per billion. Reynolds
said it takes as little as 10 parts per billion to
kill many types of vegetable
plants -- beans, peas, lettuce, tomatoes, peppers and
potatoes.
Composters, county and city officials say there has
yet to be a reported
case of clopyralid-tainted compost damaging plants in
Sonoma County.
But Washington state recently prohibited the use of
clopyralid statewide,
and California is considering its own ban. On
Tuesday, the Sonoma
County Board of Supervisors will consider urging the
state to ban the
chemical.
"The persistence of the stuff is scary," said Ken
Wells, director of the
Sonoma County Waste Management Agency, which oversees
county
landfills.
Santa Rosa utilities board member Ting Guggiana said
he is afraid the
state will move too slowly. "All the plants in the
state may be dead by that
time," he said.
The state Department of Pesticide Regulation has
moved to ban 15
products containing the herbicide, which is used on
lawns, a main
component of compost.
There is no move to ban the chemical's use on open
rangeland or timber
areas.
The decision by Santa Rosa's utilities board could
put added pressure on
the county's Mecham Road landfill, where a private
company composts
60,000 to 70,000 tons of yard waste a year.
Both Sonoma Compost and Santa Rosa use yard waste
hauled to the
landfill from unincorporated areas and the county's
nine cities.
Compost from both facilities has tested positive for
clopyralid. Santa
Rosa's compost tested as high as 12 parts per
billion; Sonoma Compost's
as high as 7 parts per billion.
Paul Paddock, co-owner of Sonoma Compost, said his
company will be
able to handle the 6,000 tons of yard waste Santa
Rosa has been
composting annually.
"We'll just have to compost more efficiently," he
said.
Paddock said his sales have been "dramatically"
reduced by the clopyralid
revelations, but that tested levels in Sonoma County
are so minuscule "that
we've had no instances of where a customer has come
back and said
they've had clopyralid damage."
Santa Rosa's decision to stop using yard waste was as
much to stop the
spread of clopyralid as it was to protect sales of
its compost, which
generates about $175,000 a year.
Santa Rosa utility board member Ross Liscum said yard
waste should be
removed from the mix until the compost can be proven
to be
clopyralid-free.
Liscum said selling clopyralid-tainted compost would
cause irreparable
long-term harm to the "reputation of our compost."
Reynolds said it takes a year or two for clopyralid
to break down enough
to be harmless.
"If no more clopyralid is used as of right now, we'd
still see it in our
compost for at least a year, possibly two," he said.
Reynolds said the city's $15 million composting
center at the regional
sewage treatment plant, off Llano Road, will continue
to produce
compost despite the yard waste ban.
Instead of yard waste from the landfill, Reynolds
said he will turn to mills
for wood chips to combine with sludge from the
treatment plant, along
with steer and chicken manure to make compost.
Santa Rosa officials expressed worries the yard waste
they are now
rejecting will be buried at the landfill.
Under state law, cities and counties must cut their
waste stream to landfills
by 50 percent, a target that will be harder to meet
if the yard waste is
dumped in the landfill.
Sonoma Compost now requires customers to sign waivers
acknowledging
the compost may contain clopyralid and are informed
about how it can be
applied to eliminate its deadly potential.
You can reach Staff Writer Mike McCoy at 521-5276 or
mmccoy@pressdemocrat.com.
Jenny Bagby
<Jenny.Bagby@ci.sea To: greenyes@grrn.org
ttle.wa.us> cc:
Sent by: Subject: [GreenYes] Clopyralid and Spokane
owner-greenyes@grrn
.org
04/19/2002 09:56 AM
Please respond to
Jenny Bagby
FYI
The Spokesman-Review
Thursday, April 18, 2002
Composting facility not accepting new waste
Wendy Harris - Staff writer
The Spokane region's troubled composting facility -- backed up with tons
of herbicide-tainted material -- has stopped accepting new waste.
The private company that operates the Colbert facility is having trouble
selling the tainted compost.
It's now hoping to find some relief in its contract with the Spokane
Regional Solid Waste System.
Norcal Waste Systems of Spokane, which has been operating the composting
facility since the fall of 2000, is maxed out with 45,000 cubic yards of
contaminated compost.
"We are out of space, the site is full," said David Prunty, Norcal's
general manager. "It's been very difficult to market it."
Norcal signed a 10-year contract with the Solid Waste System in 2000.
The system is a joint venture of the city and county, but it is managed
by the city.
"We are in discussions with them about the contract," Prunty said.
Damon Taam, the Solid Waste System's contract manager, said officials
are working with Norcal to find a solution.
"We understand their situation and it's not something they caused," Taam
said. "We are trying to develop alternatives and assist them in their
plight."
Norcal stopped accepting yard waste in mid-February. Since then, all
grass clippings, tree trimmings, weeds and other debris are being
shipped to the Roosevelt Regional Landfill in Roosevelt, at the Solid
Waste System's expense. It's costing the system about $4 more per ton to
landfill it than pay Norcal to take it, Taam said.
Norcal's entrance into Spokane's recycling market was ill-timed, Prunty
said.
Shortly after the San Francisco-based company signed its contract to
operate the Colbert composting facility, the effects of the herbicide
clopyralid were being realized.
The herbicide is found in a Dow AgroSciences product called Confront,
which has been popular with lawn care services in the region for killing
weeds, Prunty said.
But when it gets into compost material that ends up in gardens or farm
fields, it's also effective at killing broadleaf crops such as tomatoes
and peas.
Last year, Dow voluntarily pulled Confront off the market in the region,
Taam said. Then last month, the state Department of Agriculture placed a
120-day ban on the use of the herbicide. Next week, the agency will hold
a public hearing on draft rules that would restrict the use of the
herbicide.
"It's a matter of time before this herbicide gets purged from the
environment," Taam said.
In the meantime, Norcal is trying to figure out what to do with its tons
of tainted compost. The company sells its compost for $7 to $10 per
cubic yard. So far, it has only sold 7,000 cubic yards of the tainted
material and is looking for alternative markets, Prunty said.
Prunty said he doesn't know when Norcal will be able to begin accepting
yard waste again. And he declined to say whether he believes Norcal will
remain economically viable at the Colbert facility.
"It's been difficult to move the product and that is essential to us
being successful here," he said.
Norcal operates two other composting facilities in California.
The herbicide problem is the latest in a series of problems plaguing the
Colbert facility.
The Solid Waste System recently settled a suit from area homeowners over
foul odors emanating from the facility. The system was required to pay
homeowners $1.5 million and buy them out of 15 houses.
As a result of the suit, the system switched contractors and selected
Norcal, which uses an "ag bag" technology that encloses the compost in
plastic. The former contractor cured the material in the open.
When Norcal received complaints last summer from neighbors about the
continuing odor, it improved its ventilation practices and added wood
chips to the debris to diffuse the odor.
.Wendy Harris can be reached at (509) 459-5433 or by e-mail at
wendyh@spokesman.com.
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