After releasing a short list of confirmed speakers earlier this month for the county's solid waste forum scheduled for Feb. 28, the county now has the full list of presenters, which includes the addition of two owners of green businesses.
Roberta Windham, county media liaison, said that the earlier list had included several speakers from national solid waste organizations and a representative from Waste Not! Carroll, a grassroots coalition interested in solid waste issues, but had calls out to several other presenters at that time.
It took a few more weeks to confirm the additional guests, she said, but now the list is complete. The new presenters include Steven Chafitz, president of electronics recycling business e-End in Frederick; and Nelson Widdel, marketing and sales director of The Peninsula Compost Group LLC, which has a commercial composting operation in Wilmington, Del. In addition, six other companies that have made proposals to the county for alternative options for solid waste management have agreed to attend, though will only be given five minutes each to speak, compared to the 15 minutes for the invited speakers.
Thom Metzger will now represent the National Solid Waste Management Association instead of Chaz Miller, and John Carlton will represent Gershman, Brickner & Bratton Inc., a solid waste management consulting firm.
The forum will begin with an introduction by Commissioner Doug Howard, R-District 5, and an overview of the county's current solid waste management services and demands by Tom Rio, county director of public works.
Jeffrey Topper, deputy director of solid works, said Rio will discuss how the county produces about 103,000 tons of solid waste per year, and ships 85 to 90 percent of that waste to a landfill in Pennsylvania. If the county were to continue operating in this way, Northern Landfill would last until 2062, he said.
Rio will also discuss the county's current obligations under a contract to build a 1,500-ton-per-day waste-to-energy incinerator with Frederick County, and give an overview of the time frame of that project. The incinerator is in the permitting and design process and is expected to be wrapping up that stage in July, and would probably be ready to go out for bonding in October, Topper said.
Windham said while Rio's presentation will include some information on the county's current situation of being in a contract for an incinerator, the overall purpose of the forum is not to compare the incinerator deal with Frederick to other alternatives. Rather, all methods discussed should be considered as possible options, she said.
"It's still an option for dealing with solid waste," Windham said of waste-to-energy, "but it's not a focus."
While the presenters won't be focusing on the county's waste-to-energy plans, the audience will still be allowed to ask questions about the deal, Windham said. The county is asking that residents submit their questions at the beginning and during the forum, to then be asked by the forum's moderator, Kathy Hill, a local attorney. Residents will be able to make their own comments, limited to three minutes, at the end of the presentations and question period.
One organization that will not be presenting at the Feb. 28 meeting is ALFA Group LLC, a private business that is proposing building a plasma gasification plant in Taneytown. Windham said the company was invited to present but turned down the opportunity. The county staff and commissioners will not have much to say on ALFA's proposal either, Windham said, because at this point it is still a city issue for Taneytown to evaluate rather than the county government.
When the initial list of presenters was listed earlier this month, some members of the environmental community had criticized the county for having so many representatives from the industry, including several organizations that are promoters of waste-to-energy incineration.
After reviewing the complete list, Don West, of Waste Not! Carroll, the only Carroll presenter besides county government representatives, said he is just happy to be included as one of the major presenters.
"It's an opportunity to be on the same platform as those other individuals," he said, and to share the research his group has done.
Windham said there are other technologies and solid waste methods that the county would have liked to include in the solid waste forum, but wasn't possible at this time.
"We don't have everything represented, and I don't claim that we do," Windham said. "I think for what we can do under the circumstances, it's a fairly balanced start, and it won't be our only effort."
