America's Hot Garbage Problem
64 points by petethomas 4 days ago | 25 comments- freetime2 4 days ago
- Animats 4 days agoShoreline, where Google HQ is, was a garbage dump. All those low hills are garbage. At one time they had a methane collection system driving a small power plant, but there's no longer enough methane for that. Once there was a methane fire at a concert.
Palo Alto and Menlo Park had similar garbage dumps, and their hilly parks along the shore of the bay are also trash.
- oefrha 4 days agoPretty weird this long article never mentioned waste-to-energy (other than sucking methane out of landfills, which according to the article is making uncontrolled garbage fires more common). Garbage should burn, in modern incineration plants with strict emission standards. Landfills are unsustainable and should be considered a thing of the past.
- 3eb7988a1663 4 days ago
The largest landfill in the USA is the Apex Landfill, at about 3 square miles (7.7 km2) with an estimated capacity of ~1000 million tons. The entire country landfills some 150 million tons per year. That is, a single landfill in Nevada could take all of the country's trash for six years.Landfills are unsustainable...We could build landfills indefinitely. It is a logistics and political issue.
- freetime2 4 days agoIncineration produces ash that ends up in landfills. The volume is of course a lot smaller, but I think there will always be a need for landfills. In fact, my city just opened up a new landfill specifically for incineration by-products a couple years ago. And as people are producing more and more trash every year, demand for such facilities will likely continue to increase.
- comex 4 days agoAt least the ash won’t participate in uncontrolled burning.
- comex 4 days ago
- toomuchtodo 4 days ago
- 3eb7988a1663 4 days ago
- HotGarbage 4 days agoI'm everyone's problem
- aspenmayer 4 days agoMaybe if you were hotter you’d blow up as the kids say and be more popular.
- aspenmayer 4 days ago
- burnt-resistor 4 days agoThese are "sacrifice zones". See also: every superfund site, Hinkley CA, many spots in WV, Four Corners, most of Houston, Cancer Alley between NOLA and BRLA, and golf courses built on top of toxic fly ash.
- scns 4 days ago> golf courses built on top of toxic fly ash
Better than houses and playgrounds, am i wrong?
- subscribed 4 days agoSeriously, this and ex-industrial sites are two types of land I believe golf courses should be built on.
Not pristine land, not protected nature sites.
- subscribed 4 days ago
- atleastoptimal 4 days agoThis, and Flint MI, is why I have very little trust in many public institutions. At least in the US, there is a recurrent failure to abandon profitable aims even to save human lives. It is very much a reality of every person for themselves that does not square with the material wealth of the US.
- kube-system 4 days ago> very little trust in many public institutions.
As opposed to...... the private institutions that created most of those problems?
- usui 4 days agoThis is a strawman. The OP didn't mention trusting private institutions over public institutions, just that you can't ever trust American public institutions to do the right thing for you before being dragged kicking and screaming. What the poster says is true. Living in the US is coming to terms with "every person for themselves" is reality, and that it "does not square with the material wealth of the US". You can trust public institutions to some extent more than private, but interacting with them is still all about fending for yourself. Being familiar with the American government and living in another country that treats its citizens much better (at least for daily operations and processes) opens your eyes to how bad it is. It's a horror how much money the US has while failing to invest the majority of profits back into raising standards for everyone. Dozens of countries do better with much less.
- meepmorp 4 days agopublicly traded institutions, maybe?
- usui 4 days ago
- bluGill 4 days agoThe us is a large place with a lot of media so there is a lot of problems - but in proportion things are good, exposeure makes it seem bad but it is not.
if you don't hear about problems the correct assumption is that things are bad and the coverup is working. Assuming things are better elsewhere is bad. Unless you personally check it of course, which you cannot do and live a life
- kube-system 4 days ago
- scns 4 days ago
- MathMonkeyMan 4 days agoIt's interesting that by overdrawing methane (for energy), you introduce oxygen, which makes the compost pile too hot. I wouldn't have thought of that.
Lets build an aerobically bio-heated power station!
- Havoc 4 days agoSounds like a toothless regulator problem to me