Annual Landfill Capacity Report

Eleventh Annual Landfill Capacity Report - 1997

Reporting Period: Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 1997

Preface

Since its establishment in 1970, The Illinois EPA has overseen the development and operation of a productive system of modern sanitary landfills. The Agency sees to it that these facilities meet the strictest disposal standards in history, and that they are engineered to be fully protective of human health and the environment, especially where it concerns any possibility of groundwater contamination.

Although the number of active landfills in Illinois dipped to 56 in 1997, their total capacity soared to an all-time high during that year, and their ability to absorb municipal wastes remained at a level ensuring there will be no landfill capacity crisis in Illinois, either now or in the foreseeable future.

This is the Agency's 11th annual report on landfill disposal and available landfill capacity in Illinois. Even if landfill development and expansion were to come to a halt (a truly unlikely prospect), sufficient capacity exists to handle the state's requirements for landfill disposal of nonhazardous solid waste for the next 15 years.

State government, seeking to avoid potential crises, has asked all Illinois counties to adopt well-conceived plans to accommodate their future disposal needs. Additionally, 18 counties and the city of Chicago have been delegated the authority to inspect landfills, transfer stations and compost sites in their jurisdictions, providing a needed service to the citizens of Illinois. All of these activities are reflected in this publication.

The Agency hopes you will find this information useful and instructive, and welcomes your comments and suggestions as to how it may be improved.

Executive Summary

This is the Illinois EPA's 11th annual report describing the management of nonhazardous municipal solid waste by the state's solid waste landfills and transfer stations. The report is divided into sections representing Illinois EPA administrative regions.

Each regional section includes newly designed specification pages describing the chief physical characteristics of each landfill; its location and hours of operation; tipping fee; quantities of wastes received (in gate cubic yards, tons, and tons per day) for the last three years; the landfill's certified remaining capacity (in gate cubic yards and tons) for the last two reporting dates; solid waste management fees paid in 1997; which Agency regional field office or delegated local authority inspects the facility; and the name, address and phone number of the landfill's owner and operator.

Similar but scaled down specification pages are included for each transfer station. In all, this report includes details of 69 landfills and 76 transfer stations.

Illinois municipal solid waste landfills are required to report to the Illinois EPA the quantities of solid waste they receive each year, and to calculate and report the amount of remaining capacity existing on the first day of the following year.

During 1997, 56 landfills reported receiving 40,393,792 gate cubic yards of waste. This volume was 5,740,414 gate cubic yards less than the total received during 1996, or an 11.8 percent decline.

As of Jan. 1, 1998, 56 landfills reported having a combined remaining capacity of 623,094,000 gate cubic yards, or 211,186,000 gate cubic yards more than on Jan. 1, 1997, an increase of 51.3 percent.

Dividing wastes disposed during 1997 by capacity remaining on Jan. 1, 1998, indicates a landfill life expectancy in Illinois of 15.4 years, at 1997 disposal rates, barring capacity adjustments.