City’s Plans To Change Flow Control Change Again
The landfill company which may lose business because of the city of El Paso’s planned flow control system has filed suit.
According to city officials, Waste Connections, the company that owns the Camino Real landfill, claims their contract with the city ends in 2014. Currently, the majority of El Paso garbage is disposed of at Camino Real. Flow control is scheduled to begin in 2011.That’s a system in which garbage produces in El Paso is hauled to city-owned landfills, not private ones. The city had planned to open the McCombs landfill and expand the Clint landfill, at a cost of about $18.5 million.
City Council this week gave the green light for city attorneys to settle with Waste Connections. That could mean staying in the contract, and postponing flow control until 2014.
If that happens, then Ellen Smyth, the Director for the city’s Environmental Services Department, said the municipality could begin talks with Fort Bliss to collaborate on a waste energy plant on post. The plant would convert trash into electricity.
“You burn it (garbage) hot and clean, so there’s no air emissions, and you take that energy from the heat, and you produce steam, so you have a steam generator which turns a turban and then it generates the electricity”, said Smyth.
The plant would have a solar energy component, too.
Smyth said city officials have met with representatives on post and El Paso Electric officials to discuss the project. Smyth said they’re hoping El Paso Electric would partner up to convert the electricity.
Estimates for the cost of the project have been about $750 million. “We wouldn’t really want to pay any part of it, our contribution would be the trash”, said Smyth.
The budget for Smyth’s department is about $35 million this fiscal year. She said that if the city were to incur costs on the project, they’d have to stay within her budget. “No sense in going through all of these projects and then have the rates go up, that kind of defeats the whole purpose”, she said.
The city hopes the project will either lower garbage rates, or freeze them for a long period of time, such as 15 years. If the plant were to open, the city would avoid having to open the McCombs landfill.
