RIALTO >> The rumble and roar of bulldozers, dump trucks pervade the Mid Valley Landfill, which spans 448 acres and is the most active of San Bernardino County’s five landfills and nine transfer stations.
Things have been bustling here the past two years — since the county entered into a 10-year trash-hauling contract with City of Industry-based Athens Services. That’s because Athens, per its contract, promised to import 800,000 tons of solid waste annually to the county to generate more revenue.
“This takes the lion’s share of the imported waste Athens brings in,” said Rex Richardson, solid waste programs administrator for the county’s Solid Waste Management Division, during a recent tour of the landfill.
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Per the terms of its $16.7 million contract with the county, Athens also guaranteed it would generate a minimum of $14.8 million in revenue for the county in its first year and $23.3 million in revenue every year after that.
Athens exceeded the first-year goal, raking in $15.2 million in revenue, and it expects to generate more than $26 million for the county in its second year, said Anthony Bertrand, area vice president for Athens Services.
It has been welcoming news for the county after a 35 percent decline in solid waste delivery at the county’s landfills from 2007 to 2013, during the Great Recession. In April 2013, the county decided to part ways with its former trash hauler of 12 years, Burrtec Waste, and go with Athens Services instead.
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Athens subsequently purchased $30 million in low-emission heavy equipment, which was purchased in San Bernardino County so the county could reap the $130,000 in sales tax revenue, said Anthony Bertrand, area vice president for Athens Services.
The new low-emission equipment is helping cut back on greenhouse gas emissions and making composting more efficient as well, Bertrand said.
In its first year, he said Athens increased the county’s landfill recycling rate by 11 percent and reduced air pollutants by 260 tons.
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“The sites are being run more efficiently now than they ever have in the past,” Bertrand said. “They’re operating on a smaller carbon footprint than they did two years before.”
Donning a white hard hat and fluorescent yellow vest during the recent tour at the Mid Valley Landfill, Richardson explained another way the county is making the most efficient use of its energy sources. He pointed to a white pipeline stretching along a large dirt mound, which he said sucks up landfill gas and diverts it to a flare system, which converts the gas to electricity that is fed into Southern California Edison’s grid.
Mid Valley can accommodate a maximum of 7,500 tons of trash and 2,500 vehicles a day. It takes in an average of 3,000 to 5,000 tons of solid waste daily and an average of 300,000 tons a year, Richardson said. He said 30 percent of the waste brought in comes from residential neighborhoods, while 40 percent is from businesses and 30 percent is non-hazardous industrial waste.
In its first year, Athens imported 900,000 tons of solid waste from Los Angeles County to San Bernardino County, exceeding its minimum annual import rate by 100,000 tons, Bertrand said.
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In October, Athens Services opened a state-of-the-art waste separation facility in Sun Valley, and plans to import waste from that facility to San Bernardino County as well, Bertrand said.
Though Athens has generated about $40 million in revenue for the county in the past two years, that amount dwindles to about $10.1 million after factoring in overhead costs such as fees for the burial of solid waste, host fees, and fees to the state Board of Equalization. But the largest expense is revenue set aside to cover the future costs associated with the closure and ongoing maintenance of other landfills, Richardson said.
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He said the county is maintaining about 30 closed landfills, and the cost to continue maintaining them over the next 30 years is projected to be somewhere in the ballpark of $120 million. But the county is hoping Athens Services can help cut that projected cost in half, to about $60 million, Richardson said.