EGN NEWS DESK
Coffin Butte, a quickly rising landfill in Oregon that’s leaking explosive ranges of methane, has caught the eye of state and federal officers. On August 8, Oregon’s U.S. senators, Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, and one in all its U.S. House members, Val Hoyle, wrote a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency urging it to step up an ongoing investigation of the web site.
The legislators’ letter is the results of years of advocacy by residents of Benton County, the place Coffin Butte is positioned. Over the previous decade, they’ve watched the landfill develop in dimension as the quantity of trash arriving there has doubled. Then, in 2022, an EPA inspection discovered 21 spots on the landfill the place methane emissions exceeded 10,000 elements per million (ppm) — far over the federal restrict of 500 ppm. Residents are involved concerning the local weather impacts of those emissions, the chance of wildfires posed by this extremely flammable fuel, and the well being results of publicity to poisonous chemical compounds emitted alongside methane.
Merkley first discovered about Coffin Butte Landfill at a city corridor this February, the place residents spoke concerning the landfill’s results on their day-to-day lives and the way its emissions contribute to local weather change (methane is a potent greenhouse fuel that over 20 years traps 80 instances as a lot warmth within the environment as carbon dioxide).
“Certainly, their considerations resonated with me, their considerations about fires, concerning the scent, and considerations about their well being,” Merkley informed Canary Media. At a May listening to, the senator raised the problem with EPA Administrator Michael Regan. In response, Regan stated he couldn’t remark as a result of Coffin Butte is the topic of an “lively enforcement scenario,” however he assured Merkley that the EPA is “laser-focused” on the landfill. In June, the EPA performed a second inspection of Coffin Butte Landfill, the outcomes of that are forthcoming.
Republic Services, the corporate that operates Coffin Butte, “has had a lot of time to turn into a good group member and deal with all of this methane leakage. And now we’re going to seek out out on this new report whether or not or not they’ve carried out so,” Merkley stated.
Meanwhile, Oregon’s Department of Environmental Quality has issued warnings to Republic Services for not complying with 2021 state rules mandating that landfills cut back methane emissions. The rules required Republic Services to conduct emissions testing at two flares by March 2023. In July, the DEQ concluded that the testing was not “accomplished or tried” and that Republic Services dedicated a Class I violation — probably the most critical stage — of the requirement.
