Buyer found for old trash-burning power plant – Columbus, Ohio

Is this re-use, recycling or energy recovery (or all three)?





The US newspaper Columbus Dispatch reports that a buyer has been found for the city’s waste incinerator that has been sitting idle for eight years.





Michael Long, executive director of the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio, said on Monday the proposed sale to a tyre-recycling company is environmentally friendly and promises a US$6 million payment up front. The company, Landstar Rubber Recovery of Scottdale, Ariz., would like to begin by next spring processing 10 million tyres a year, said President Elroy Fimrite. Fimrite said the company’s proposal requires no permit from the Environmental Protection Agency because the plant will not release any emissions.





The tyres are treated with compounds and ground into a substance that looks like coffee grounds and can be sold for use in asphalt, gymnasium flooring and auto parts, he said. The sale needs the approval of the Columbus City Council and the waste authority’s board. The power plant was closed in 1994 because of financial and environmental problems.





At a news conference Monday, Long signed a memorandum describing what Landstar is proposing to do and the schedule for paying the authority, which would pass on the money to the city. The waste authority, which leases the 40-acre facility from the city, would receive US$5 per ton of tyres recycled, about US$50,000 a year, that it would use to promote recycling and extend the life of the county landfill, Long said. The city still owes US$89.7 million on the power plant. Haulers in the county pay a US$7-a-ton surcharge on trash dumped in the landfill, which generates US$8 million a year to pay that debt, he said. The city would retain ownership of the land, leasing it to Landstar for US$1 a year for 50 years.