House Committee Talks Leaking Landfills

Casper's Solid Waste Manager was in Cheyenne Friday meeting with a house committee as they consider a bill that would determine when and where dollars will go to cover the cost of remediating leaking landfills and the resulting contaminated ground water.

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Cindy Langston, Waste Management director for the city of Casper, sat with the house committee Friday morning.

"DEQ is going to be directed by the legislation to start coming up with a process for prioritizing the clean up throughout  the state on leaking landfills.  So, across Wyoming its a really big issue right now to close the  leaking landfills or close and go to a more efficient system, which in the majority of cases these little landfills are going to be hauling to  bigger landfills like they do in the surrounding states"

Langston says Casper, as a regional landfill, will be servicing many surrounding smaller communities.

Another related bill, senate file 121 is also being watched closely by land fill operators. That bill clarifies and brings into state statute rules for land fill design and construction and sets forth the process for new applications.

The estimated cost for cleanup and closure of sites across the state is upwards of  $200  million dollars.

Langston says Casper is looking at somewhere between $14 to $20 million in cleanup costs.

She says right now the state has about $4 million available for first steps including the cost of prioritizing those problem sites.