Apex Landfill looking to grow its rail services in Jefferson County

STEUBENVILLE -- Interstate Waste Service's Apex Landfill is looking to grow its rail services, but the Jefferson County commissioners were wary that it might lead to an expansion of the landfill itself.

At Thursday's meeting, IWS Apex's John Walker told commissioners they're looking for a public sponsor and letters of support to accompany their application for federal funding for a $25.6 million expansion that would include earthwork paving ($10.5 million), track construction ($3.3 million), a gondola building ($3.6 million), equipment ($6.2 million) and powerline relocation, ($2 million.)

Walker said they're asking for 80 percent in government match with 20 percent private match, "on top of approaching $100 million of private investment in the system over the last two years."

Walker told commissioners they've been making upgrades to the property, including spending a half-million dollars on a gas vaporization system, and are taking steps to "alleviate" the Mingo Junction yards, source of frequent odor complaints.

"We'd like to install an additional 5,000 feet of rail track and build a gondola facility, all while creating 25 more jobs," he said.

IWS's David Cieply told Graham the company had put in 80 acres of intermediate cap to address odor issues that the former owners never resolved, pointing out each acre "is, say, $65,000 or $70,000." IWS also invested about a half-million dollars on a state-of-the-art vapor gasification system, he said.

"How much more landfill material will you be able to bring in as a result of what you want to expand?" Graham asked.

"We have to live and die by our permit," Cieply replied. "Our permit has a capped restriction. On a given day we cannot exceed 10,000 tons. Right now we're taking anywhere from 7,000 tons to 7,500 tons a day. What we potentially have control of would come in on the (gondolas) and what not that we're talking about would be another 1,200 to 1,500 max per day, so we would target maybe around 9,000 in that capacity."

While they can't process more than their 10,000-ton per day permit, Maple pointed out that doesn't mean there won't be more trash in rail cars waiting to be processed.

"You just said you'll stop the rail cars, but the trash is still sitting in the county if it's in the rail cars," he said. "You hit 9,000 but the pipeline's still sitting there, right? You quit putting it in for the day but (that doesn't) stop the rail cars from coming in."

"Until it hits the working phase, it really doesn't count as an actual function of the 10,000 so there would be some excess volume," Cieply conceded, though adding the new track would alleviate the cars sitting in Mingo Junction.

Maple asked Cieply why county and local government leaders should give IWS Apex letters of support "and not just say, 'You're a big company, fund it yourself."

Cieply pointed to job creation as a primary motivator, saying IWS would need 25 more people to handle the additional equipment needed to process the additional 1,200 to 1,500 tons.

"I want to applaud you for the nuisance odor complaints," Maple said. "I've sat here with no ability to enforce, all I could do was give a voice to those people who had odor complaints. You still have some but compared to what we had here. I used to argue there had to be some technology, and you guys have taken it on here. I thank you for that. But the rub has to be we should not be the place that other communities in the U.S. put their trash. So the question is, how do I support your project? I want to support jobs, I don't want to support expansion."

"I would say it is job growth," Walker said. "We are operating in a compliant and safe manner. You can guess volume will increase but we are not going after a landfill expansion (as a result of the) rail expansion, nor are we going after the daily max. We're simply asking to operate as we are permitted today and (use some) of the excess capacity in our permit."

Graham pointed out the commissioners have had "bad experiences with previous owners, and the hell residents of the area have had to go through in terms of the odor."

"I'm not saying you haven't done a great job," he said. "It would be hard for me to support any letter that calls for any type of expansion. You can do that without us, but for me to support anything like that would be very difficult for me to do."

Morelli also was uncomfortable with the idea of growing landfill operations,

"The question every one of us has is how much more expansion? That would be hard to vote for," Morelli said. "When I ran, I said I would be against any new landfills and I would want to be sure the landfills we do have are doing what they are supposed to be doing. No matter which way, if I agreed to sign the letter or not, you could still bring in 10,000 tons a day."

IWS Apex's Kate Deland said there would be no physical landfill expansion.

"There could be additional tonnage, but if it's managed well, I think that's a critical piece of this," she said. "If it's managed well and with the use of modernized technology, will there be an impact? We don't think so. It's all about management of what you have on site there.

After the meeting, Morelli said he has no idea what position they, as a board, will take on the landfill's request.

Graham, though, wasn't budging.

"When they start talking expansion, which is what they're talking about, I definitely do not support a letter with regard to any expansion of that," Graham said. "They wouldn't do it unless they plan on making money from it. They wouldn't spend all that money unless they're going to bring in more tonnage to Jefferson County, more garbage, and I won't support that. That doesn't mean I can stop them, but they're not going to get my support."