Annual Landfill Capacity Report

Twelfth Annual Landfill Capacity Report - 1998

Reporting Period: Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 1998

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.

This is the Agency's 12th annual report on landfill disposal and available landfill capacity in Illinois. The number of active landfills in Illinois accepting waste in 1998 increased from 56 to 58, and their total capacity soared to an all-time high during that year. Sufficient capacity exists to handle the state's requirements for landfill disposal of nonhazardous solid waste for the next 17 years, ensuring there should be no landfill capacity crisis in Illinois for the foreseeable future.

The State of Illinois, seeking to avoid potential crises, has asked all Illinois counties to adopt well-conceived plans to accommodate their future disposal needs. Additionally, 18 counties, the Ambraw Valley Solid Waste Agency 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.

Thomas V. Skinner
Director

Executive Summary

This is the Illinois EPA's 12^th 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 1998; 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 68 landfills, 79 transfer stations and 53 compost facilities.

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 1998, 58 landfills reported receiving 44.8 million gate cubic yards of waste. This volume was 4.4 million gate cubic yards more than the total received during 1997, or a 10 percent increase.

As of Jan. 1, 1999, 56 landfills reported having a combined remaining capacity of 749.3 million gate cubic yards, or 126.3 million gate cubic yards more than on Jan. 1, 1998, an increase of 20 percent.

Dividing wastes disposed during 1998 by capacity remaining on Jan. 1, 1999, indicates a landfill life expectancy in Illinois of 17 years, at 1998 disposal rates, barring capacity adjustments.