Food scrap recycling failing NYC sniff test, so far

(AP Photo/Stephen Groves)

Stephen R. Groves reports for the Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — New Yorkers are so far turning up their noses at the city’s ambitious organics collection program, which has stalled because not enough people are participating in the often-smelly chore of separating out all those table scraps, spoiled meat, rotted vegetables and cut grass.Mayor Bill de Blasio introduced his pilot program five years ago, hoping hundreds of thousands of tons of the city’s leftovers and yard waste would be churning their way through the system by now to be turned into compost, gas or electricity.But expansion has been put on hold because not enough people are pitching in to make it cost-effective. The city collected only about 13,000 tons from residents last year and found that the 3.5 million people currently in the voluntary program are only separating 10.6 percent of their potential scraps.”Honestly, I think it’s a complete waste of time,” says Anselmo Ariza, who maintains the trash and recycling bins for several blocks of apartment buildings in Brooklyn. “Some people use them, but most of them just put trash and plastic bags in there.”Marzena Golonka complained that the city’s once-a-week pickup at her apartment building in Brooklyn is not frequent enough to keep the odors and rats away.”It’s vile,” she says. “Until sanitation starts doing their job effectively, I’m not going to have a brown bin.”De Blasio’s goal of sending zero waste to landfills by 2030 depends on residents and businesses separating their organic waste, which currently makes up a third of the trash that ends up in landfills and is a major producer of greenhouse gases.But when not enough people use the service, the city’s trucks devoted to such waste are not filled, increasing the costs per ton. And without a steady stream of scraps, the expensive infrastructure that needs to be built to process the waste into compost, gas, or electricity is not worth it.The city is still committed to expanding the program to all 8.5 million New York City residents at some point but right now is focused on making the system more efficient, Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia said last week.One budget watchdog group estimates that collecting organics costs over five times more than collecting normal garbage. Ana Champeny, the Director of City Studies at the Citizen’s Budget Commission, calculated the collection cost for organics at around $1,700 a ton, compared with $291 for regular refuse. That only adds to the overall cost of a program the commission estimates at $177 million to $251 million every year.Sanitation officials are trying to get more people to use the service by going door to door and even putting thank-you notes on the brown bins they gave residents for organics.And the city is trying to address the smell issue by reminding people that the brown bins, unlike many recycling bins, can be sealed tight.Read the full storyLike this? Click to receive free updates

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Ireland warned that it faces a landfill-capacity emergency



In 2011, Ireland had 127 working landfill sites. Now there are just four, with two taking the bulk of the country’s waste. 


Christina Finn reports for The Journal.ie


Ireland is approaching zero capacity in its landfills, Minister Denis Naughten was expected to tell an environmental conference yesterday.
In his address to the Environment Ireland event in Croke Park, Naughten planned to say that Ireland is approaching an emergency waste situation if the country exceeds projections.
In 2011, Ireland had 127 working landfill sites. Now there are just four, with two taking the bulk of the country’s waste. 
Last year, in a bid to move away from the reliance on landfill sites, the minister rolled out the use of household brown bins.
At the time, he warned that in just three years, there is going to be a 17% shortfall in landfills.
“Effectively meaning we will have no landfill capacity for two months of the year,” he explained.
Naughten said too much food and organic waste is ending up in the regular black bins.
In order to ramp up recycling, all waste collectors were required to start rolling-out food and organic brown bins to all localities nationwide with a population greater than 500 people.
In his address to the conference today, the minister will outline that Ireland is still producing too much waste. The months up to Christmas are the busiest time of year for waste production. While Naughten states that Ireland is currently managing, there are fears we could be approaching crisis point. 
The minister will also outline new plans to tackle plastic waste. 
The latest figures show that Ireland is the largest producer of waste plastic in Europe — totaling 61kg per person per year, according to Environment Ireland. 
Naughten will shortly bring a memo to Cabinet outlining a zero-tolerance approach to single-use plastics in government and State-funding buildings. 

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Study finds PFAS levels at Dix/McGuire/Lakehurst military bases 24,000 times higher than proposed federal standard

Data also shows some PFAS levels exceed EPA health advisory

Maguire-Dix-Lakehurst









Jon Hurdle reports for NJ Spotlight:
Water sources at New Jersey’s Joint Base Maguire-Dix-Lakehurst contained levels of toxic PFAS chemicals that were up to 24,000 times higher than a health limit recommended by a federal agency this year, according to a new national analysis by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The nonprofit compared the results of Defense Department testing with the limits proposed by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry and found that the presence of some PFAS (perfluoroalkyl sulfonate) chemicals exceeded the agency’s proposed levels at the base by even more than they did when compared with looser standards advocated by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Previously reported DOD testing in 2016 found two of the chemicals, PFOA (perfluorooctanoic acid) and PFOS (perfluorooctanesulfonic acid), as high as 264,300 parts per trillion (ppt) among many sites tested in and around the sprawling South Jersey military base. That was 24,027 times higher than the 11 ppt recommended by the ATSDR as the upper limit for safe human consumption, the Union of Concerned Scientists said.
It also sharply exceeded an EPA health guideline of 70 ppt for the two chemicals combined.

Nearby population at risk?

Using DOD data, the analysis also noted that 27,879 people live within three miles of the base, potentially exposing them to hazardous levels of the chemicals that are linked to illnesses including kidney and testicular cancers, ulcerative colitis, and thyroid disease. The study covered 131 bases nationwide, and found the highest PFAS concentrations, at up to 1 million times the ATSDR level, at bases in Louisiana, California, Florida, and Delaware.
In New Jersey, the DOD found three private wells near the Maguire base contained the two chemicals at a level that exceeded the EPA’s recommendation. It provided homeowners there with bottled water until filtration systems were installed.
The report also compared PFOS and PFOA contamination at the former Naval Air Warfare Center in Trenton and found it was 2,527 times above the ATSDR’s safe health level.

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When EPA re-writes the rules, scientists are not required

Steven Mufson, Chris Mooney report for the Washington Post:
When former EPA administrator Scott Pruitt launched an effort to limit what kinds of scientific studies could be used to protect public health, he left out some key experts: the Environmental Protection Agency’s own Office of the Science Advisor, according to an email exchange obtained by The Washington Post.
Tom Sinks, director of the office, said in an April 24 email that “Even though OSA and I have not participated in the development of this document and I just this moment obtained it (have yet to read it), I am listed as the point of contact.”
Sinks added, accurately, that “the proposal likely touches upon three aspects of OSA work — public access to EPA funded research, human subjects research protection, and scientific integrity” — all of which fall in his area of responsibility.
The email was released in response to a Freedom of Information Act request by the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The proposed rule, dubbed “Strengthening Transparency in Regulatory Science,” has ranked as one of the conservatives’ top priorities for years. It would allow the EPA to consider only studies for which the underlying data is publicly available and can be reproduced by other researchers. Such restrictions could alter how the agency protects Americans from toxic chemicals, air pollution, radiation, and other health risks, adding to the agency’s broader deregulatory agenda.
“It’s astounding that the EPA science adviser’s office was left completely out of the loop during the development of a major science policy proposal,” said Michael Halpern, deputy director of the center for science and democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “Crafting any significant proposal behind closed doors without even bothering to notify career scientific staff suggests that it’s much more about politics than it is about science.”
In a statement, the agency countered that “EPA received input from a number of stakeholders and utilized the intra and interagency process to ensure a robust proposal was put forward.”

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University bringing campus to NJ’s Fort Monmouth

Fort MonmouthDan Radel reports for the Asbury Park Press:

OCEANPORT – New Jersey City University is making plans to open a campus at Fort Monmouth.

NJCU is one of Brookdale Community College’s university partners and it appears as if the partnership will continue even as NJCU opens its own location.

An agreement was reached Sept. 25 between the state agency redeveloping the Fort Monmouth property and developer KKF University Enterprises for a “state-of-the-art, satellite campus in the heart of Fort Monmouth’s main post” for NJCU.

NJCU President Sue Henderson spoke at a June meeting of the Monmouth County Board of Freeholders and indicated the Fort Monmouth campus would be for juniors and seniors who completed two years at Brookdale.

The fort campus would have 15 classrooms including nursing labs, which according to Henderson could increase the enrollment of Brookdale’s nursing program.

According to the purchase and sale agreement, KKF will buy historic Squier Hall for $2.5 million and invest a minimum of $10 million to renovate the 1935-era administrative building.



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How’s NJ Gov. Murphy doing after 9 months in office?

Brent Johnson reports for NJ.com:


A pair of new polls paints slightly different pictures of Gov. Phil Murphy‘s approval rating among New Jersey voters after nine months in office.

A Quinnipiac University Poll released Wednesday found the rookie Democratic governor continues to be popular, with 54 percent of the Garden State’s likely voters approving of his performance, compared to 34 percent disapproving.

That appears to be the highest approval rating that any recent New Jersey governor has received in a Quinnipiac poll at this point in their first term.

The group’s archives show Murphy’s predecessor, Chris Christie, at 51 percent in November 2010; Jon Corzine at 45 percent in September 2006; and Jim McGreevey at 44 percent in October 2002.

Richard Codey, the then-state Senate president who took over as governor when McGreevey resigned in 2004, had a 76 percent approval rating about four months into his tenure in a Rutgers-Eagleton poll.

Murphy’s support is heavily split along party lines. Fellow Democrats approve of him, 89 percent to 5 percent. Among Republicans, it’s 13 percent to 73 percent. And among independents, its 47 percent to 40 percent.

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That’s not a shock. New Jersey is a blue state, with registered Democratic voters outnumbering registered Republicans nearly 2-to-1.

Wednesday’s numbers are similar to a Quinnipiac poll from August, which found Murphy’s approval rating among registered Garden State voters was 54 percent, while 34 percent disapproved.

But Wednesday’s poll is not technically comparable because it includes a narrower focus. It was conducted Sept. 25 to Oct. 2 with 1,058 New Jersey voters who are not just registered but likely to vote.

The survey has a margin of error of plus-or-minus 4.1 percentage points.


Meanwhile, Murphy’s marks were lower in a Stockton University poll released Monday.

That survey showed 41 percent of New Jersey’s likely voters say Murphy is doing an excellent or good job, while 27 percent rate him as fair and 25 percent as poor.

The Stockton poll has faced criticism, though, over its methodology.

The survey was conducted via phone with 531 adult likely voters in the state. Its margin of error is plus-or-minus 4.25 percentage points.

Murphy, a multimillionaire former Goldman Sachs banking executive and ex-U.S. ambassador to Germany, succeeded Christie, a Republican, in January.

His good grades from voters come despite the friction he’s experienced with fellow Democrats who control the state Legislature. Murphy and top lawmakers avoided what would have been the second state government shutdown in two years by reaching an 11th-hour deal on the governor’s first state budget.

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