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• 1 media/IMG_0659.jpg 2013-12-19T18:20:20-08:00 Landfills and Dump: An Introduction 13 What they are are revpar 2013-12-21T19:40:27-08:00
  In order to compare the treatment of detritus by the U.S. and emerging nations, it is imperative we emphasize the differences between landfills and dumps. Landfills are engineered and highly controlled land disposal sites for solid, non-hazardous waste in which delivered garbage is spread and compacted in layers a few feet thick. At least once a day the wastes are covered with a layer of earth and then compacted again making trash nearly invisible. Thick sheets of plastic liners are laid down at the lowest level to prevent contamination of the earth’s soil. 
  Examples of landfills are Sunshine Canyon and Puente Hills in California.
  Conversely, a dump, as the name suggests, is a location designated for disposal of nearly any type of garbage; these sites are often only valleys, quarries, or mines whose original owners allowed people to dump trash. Along with solid wastes, dumps allow household and commercial hazardous products and industrial materials. The open dump is a danger because of its potential for producing leachate, becoming a rodent and insect breeding ground, and its general health dangers. Dumps are now illegal in the United States and landfills are closely monitored by the Environmental Protection Agency. Interestingly, while landfills are considered more sanitary, lack of oxygen causes decomposition to occur at a radically slower (almost non-existent) rate.
  Leachate and methane gas are both byproducts of collected garbage. Leachate is the liquid that results from rain and condensation, where natural moisture percolates through waste. The liquids migrating through the waste dissolve salts, pick up organic constituents and leach heavy metals. The organic strength of landfill leachate can be greater than 20 to 100 times the strength of raw sewage, making leachate a potentially potent polluter of soil and groundwater. In addition to leachate, as waste deteriorates they often produce gas. New landfills are required to have equipment to collect and pump methane gas. This gas can be burned at the surface or be refined and used as commercial fuel: in one case study, nearly 50,000 homes are provided electricity annually by the methane produced at one landfill. If not properly harnessed or disposed of, the collection of methane gas can be dangerous. Explosions and fires at old dumps and landfills are often the result of methane buildup. 
  The differentiation between landfills and dumps lends insight to the ways the U.S. views garbage. In her introduction to Dirt: The Filthy Reality of Everyday Life, Kate Ford aptly summarized the culture of waste and forgetting that surrounds North American culture: “Although specters of monstrous landfills, overflowing sewers and catastrophic oil spills might disturb our dreams, Western civilisation has become adept at overlooking the filthy reality of everyday life . . . [T]hose who do the work of keeping dirt at bay are often felt by others to be contaminated simply by their association with it, something psychologist Paul Rozin attributes to a kind of 'magical' thinking” (1-2). This quote speaks directly to how the Western world views trash: as not our problem. We can ship it to developing countries or poorer states (Leonard).
  For example, the Fresh Kills dump located on New York’s Staten Island closed in 2001 after a long and arduous fight spearheaded by community members and the Staten Island borough President. New York now ships all the trash previous sent to Fresh Kills via railway to the Carolinas (Molinaro). The average American makes seven pounds of trash a day: across a lifetime that adds up to 102 tons of trash per person. In 2010 alone, Americans accumulated 250 million tons of garbage (Gutierrez and Webster). Yet we choose to overlook this ever-expanding problem.
  In “Dishing the Dirt,” Rosie Cox delineates the historical processes that led to the Western world’s preoccupation with eliminating or glossing over dirtiness and waste. She points to the discovery of bacteria as the turning point for the development of a paranoia surrounding cleanliness: “[f]ollowing the discovery of bacteria, disinfection became the cornerstone of domestic dealings with dirt. . . [and] if germs can be eliminated by scrupulous hygiene, then the presence of disease in the home can only be due to a failure on the part of the housekeeper” (44). Cox continues to explain that “[c]leanliness, therefore, was a mark of wealth and status” (47), where the rich could afford to clean or veil their waste and the poor were destined to live amongst the debris. Landfills and their unsophisticated counterparts, dumps, perfectly illustrate the dichotomy formed between the binaries of wealth/cleanliness and poverty/dirtiness. 
• 1 media/IMG_0656 lower res.jpg 2013-12-20T15:13:51-08:00 The United States and Utopian Waste Management: Sunshine Canyon Landfill 11 Sunshine Canyon Landfill plain 2017-03-31T13:45:19-07:00
  As we learned on a recent trip to the Sunshine Canyon Landfill in the city of Sylmar in California’s San Fernando Valley, Puente Hills is not the only landfill touting scientific advances. We traveled 32 miles up the 405 freeway to the Valley from UCLA’s pristine campus in Westwood, nestled off Sunset Boulevard, bordering Beverly Hills. 
   
  We received a guided tour from one of the landfill employees who explained first-hand the activities of a first-rate facility. After passing through the entry gate welcoming us to Sunshine Canyon, and as we awaited our tour guide, we drove under a set of misters. While one might assume misters would serve to provide a reprieve to workers laboring in the heat, as soon as we meet our guide, she explains the misters are there for dust abatement. Minimizing the dust helps to reduce the smell for neighboring communities. And since the roads are made of dirt (packed over trash), there is a significant amount of dust. Odor is obviously a concern for the management at Sunshine Canyon as the property covers 136,000 acres and the nearest neighbors live only a quarter mile from the dumpsite. 
   
  Although there was a relentless line of enormous garbage trucks filing up and down the mountain, we received a shock when we saw no visible trash. High-reaching mountains of dirt surrounded us with no discernible garbage. Finally as our eyes drifted up to the highest point of the mountain, we saw a tiny island of trash. Our tour guide continued to explain all the methods the landfill employs to keep the neighbors and various environmental agencies content with their presence. She repeatedly noted that while the landfill accepts eight tons of garbage daily, the community resents the presence of the site. In order to continue running the facility, the management uses various techniques to preserve the environment and appease the neighboring communities. To protect the ground from contamination, they employ thick plastic and various levels of intervening materials then pile on top of the trash. That is, they pack down the garbage and lay 7-feet worth of different materials (from clay to rocks) above the waste, finally topping the layers off with dirt. The process of layering dirt upon the garbage allows for better retention of natural gases and keeps the ground clean, while assisting in smell reducing. Combined with the dust abatement program of the misting system and the hiding of trash under dirt and layers of plastic, our guide assures us that these sanitary methods are the ultimate in landfill technology. Our tour ends at the viewing platform where we can appreciate the manufactured panorama landscaped by trash. 
   
  While these invisible landfills easily shroud our excessive consumption, their presence is both necessary and felt. With the Puente Hills landfill closing in 2012, Sunshine Canyon now accepts a portion of the trash that was destined for the old site. But neighbors claim that since 2010, the odor escaping from Sunshine Canyon has increased to an unbearable stench (Smith). There have even been complaints filed by children at local Van Gogh Elementary. Even though the company operating the site has been fined over 55 times since 2010, the community felt insufficient action was taken and filed a lawsuit in 2012. The suit led to a $500,000 fine on the company. 
   
  Like the Staten Island community, Sylmar residents would like the landfill to close. Not only because of the smell and possible health risks, but because it stigmatizes the community. In The Fresh Kills Story they explain that New Yorkers vilified Staten Islands because of its proximity to the dump. Living next a landfill embarrasses community members and drives away businesses. This shame sharply contrasts with the attitudes we see towards dumps in emerging nations.