AUTOMATED SEPARATION METHODS

Mr. WILSON. Or the adoption of techniques that would eliminate the cost in reusing it, such as the elimination of that little aluminum ring which prevents the bottle being reused. It is also possible that we could persuade, whether it has to be by legislation or financial incentives, that we could persuade producers to put some identifying component in materials so they can be more easily separated. Some of us are trying to work out automated separation methods which seem to offer a potential for reducing the cost of disposal. It takes a lot of technology to separate these things out into usuable constituents and we may be able to solve that, but it would be much easier if there was some identifying component that could be read out by some instrument, so you could, for instance, take the trash and chop it up in one of the many pulverizers that are available and have a component pass a sensor and have it say this is brown paper and that is white paper, and so on. Senator MUSKIE. Well, I think it is an excellent objective. Do you see any way of achieving it by legislation or public policy of any kind? Mr. WILSON. A research program would first have to show that it was economically not only feasible from the engineering point of view, but economically feasible. Some of us at MIT are trying to show that we can achieve separation without this marking of materials being necessary which obviously would be a more desirable thing to do.

DISPOSAL TECHNOLOGY

Senator MUSKIE. Let me ask you about this question of disposal technology, and essentially we are still limited in most of our methods to incineration and landfill. As Mayor Collins pointed out, I forget the adjective he used; it has been a long time since we came up with anything new.

Mr. COLLINS. I think I said venerable.

Senator MUSKIE. Yes, we haven't really developed any technology that looks like a substitute, a meaningful substitute, for either of those, have we?

Separation of the metropolitan waste

Mr. WILSON. There are some experiments in the country, sir. I don't think there is as much wrong with landfill as some of us think, but some of the research in which the solid waste acts have started have come to look at whether there will be more pollution problems from landfills, but there is a company that has resorted to another technology, that is the separation of the metropolitan waste, a commercil corporation which has put in a plant in Houston which I presume you will be hearing more about later on, in which they do separate a good quantity of the trash and most of it has to be picked by men off belts, which is the way it is done in Europe, but they are trying to develop methods of removing the paper, since paper is about 50 percent and sometimes more of our total domestic solid waste output, and this would make a big difference.

Then they compost it. First they take out of the paper all the ferrons metals and quite a bit of glass and compost what is left, and the compost is something that is not too difficult to sell to gardeners. However, it is really a waste paper plant, and if they are able to in

crease the paper removal, then there will be enormous potential. There are 100,000 tons of waste paper reused in each week in the United States, and nearly all that hundred thousand tons comes from people with one truck going around looking for piles of newspaper in people's garbage cans.

Waste produced by domestic animals

Senator MUSKIE. I don't suppose you have any answer to the problem posed by domestic animals. Our figure is that domestic animals produce over a billion tons of fecal matter a year and over 400 million tons of liquid.

Mr. WILSON. It is a transportation problem. I have been amazed, suddenly here is this quantity of material that I used as a kid and have gone long distances and transported it by wheelbarrows and paid for it and suddenly I find it is something that is a nuisance and it means at the moment, I guess, these factory farms have been going only a decade or so and maybe they are still loading the environment and maybe they should be required to get rid of the problem.

Senator MUSKIE. Well, we are requiring sewage treatment plants. Mr. WILSON. Maybe if it is getting into the groundwater, here is another science that is only in its infancy, finding out what happens to groundwater as it goes from one state into another state and if we find that this is an expensive luxury that has piles of fecal matter that fouls the water

POLICY BY CRISIS

Senator MUSKIE. The old question of policy by crisis. There is quite a difference, isn't there, as Mayor Collins and President O'Leary have said, between collection programs in the city and in the suburbs.

Mr. COLLINS. I am not sure that there is that much of a problem except for the density. It is obviously easier to collect in a bedroom community where the streets are clear during the day than it is to collect in the City of Boston where there is parking at all hours of the day and there is that difference, but beyond that

Senator MUSKIE. But aren't the suburbs more or less garbage-disposal communities?

Mr. COLLINS. Oh, there is that distinction I made here.

Senator MUSKIE. Yes.

Mr. COLLINS. And as I also pointed out, that creates problems. It simply doesn't make it go away; it also creates them.

Senator MUSKIE. Well, gentlemen, thank you very much. We have some more witnesses and we would like to get to them.

Mr. COLLINS. Mr. Chairman, may I take advantage

Senator MUSKIE. I think Senator Randolph would like to ask some questions here.

TRANSPORTING OF SOLID WASTE

Senator RANDOLPH. I think that I should mention for the record that the Committee on Public Works last year, through a contract, studied the feasibility of transporting solid waste by rail from the District of Columbia to a reclaimed strip mine area in West Virginia. We found that the cost would be approximately $6 per ton. This is comparable to the cost of incineration. Is that right?

Mr. COLLINS. It is much less than the real cost.

Senator RANDOLPH. Is it much less than the real cost?

Mr. COLLINS. Yes.

Senator RANDOLPH. The major setback, as I presume it would be in Boston, was difficulty with the political jurisdictions the waste was crossing. Both of you, Professor Wilson and Mayor Collins have touched on these matters today.

I understand that Los Angeles and San Francisco are contracting now to transport their solid waste to an area which is near the Oregon border.

In other words, they are trying to avoid the political problem at the border, but they are going just as far as they can.

There are benefits to be derived, but we have to be careful, very careful that we do not follow a practice of "out of sight is out of mind." I just don't think we can do this, and you have indicated this to a degree here today.

CEMETERY PROBLEM

I notice, Mayor Collins, that you discussed the cemetery problem. You didn't come out and say that you were for cremation, but you hedged it.

Mr. COLLINS. No, I didn't, because I am not. [Laughter.]

Senator RANDOLPH. Well, do you suggest that we bury people standing up?

Mr. COLLINS. No, but there are all sorts of ways. If we can far more efficiently manage our available land, Senator, and the mere fact we have been retarded in much of what we did in the past in many areas is no reason we should continue that. I am not a manager of cemetery land or potential cemetery land, but I am certain there is a far better way to manage that land than the way we have.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE CORPORATION

Senator RANDOLPH. Mayor Collins, you commented on a concept of public works competence that would permit a trash collector to be employed in other public works fields.

Mr. COLLINS. Yes, sir.

Senator RANDOLPH. What sort of a program could you suggest? How could you take these unemployed and put them to work in another area such as you have implied?

Mr. COLLINS. One way would be the suggestion that Councilor O'Leary had or made of a public-private corporation to deal with all of the problems of the urban environment in waste management and related areas. That would mean that employees could be trained to do many things. Deal with the water problems and deal with problems of air pollution as well as handle a truck, a sophisticated piece of technological equipment that covers a different route and does something more than picking up a barrel and throwing it into the back of a truck. There are many more ways to more effectively utilize our human resources.

PUBLIC UTILITY CONCEPT

Senator RANDOLPH. One final comment, Mr. Chairman. There is discussion in some quarters of developing utilities for handling solid wastes; what do you think about the public utility idea?

Mr. COLLINS. There is a serious question of the extent to which they may be regulated for the public good. It is quite apparent to me that the National Government is having some difficulty providing overall supervision of some utilities at this point and the effectiveness of the State supervision certainly varies in both degree and kind.

So, if there is to be a public utility concept, the manner of regulation, I think, is of vital importance; and, Mr. Chairman, with all of the money that we are spending in this country to deal with our urban problems, the work that your committee is now doing and looking at the basic causes of this, I think, can be a telling blow for the need for additional research and understanding of the complex nature of this problem.

I think, really, that there is no one solution to this, whether it is taking it to an abandoned strip mine, whether it is compaction, whether it is reclamation or incineration; but what we need to do is research in depth all of the available solutions and if we could succeed with the composting across the country, we would have enough compost to cover American 2-feet thick in the first year of composting. So, there are a variety of things we could do.

Senator MUSKIE. You would take a lot of work away from politicians. [Laughter.]

Senator RANDOLPH. Of course, a final comment that is not germane perhaps. Six years ago Senator McGovern and I sponsored an amendment to cut 10 percent on our military costs. We got two votes on a rollcall. (I guess the persons that were on the amendment.)

As the years come, the problems like you are discussing today mount. We are going to have to begin to realize there are only so many dollars. We have to place them at points where we believe they are productive. And certainly, we have got to give increasing notice to the fact that the American people themselves are thinking about these defense costs in a sense that they have never thought of them before.

Mr. COLLINS. Mr. Chairman, if I may be permitted one last comment. Lest my appearance here and the appearance next week in Worcester be misconstrued, as they were by one columnist yesterday; let me say on one of the rare occasions in which I have access to the press. I have no intention of being a candidate for Governor or any other office this year or any other year. Thank you. [Laughter.]

Senator MUSKIE. Anybody else want to make a declaration? (Laughter.)

Mr. O'LEARY. I am glad he said any other office. He left out specifically city council, so if we included any other office, that covers that. Senator MUSKIE. Thank you very much. We will have a 5-minute break so that our television friends can break down their equipment. (A brief recess was then taken.)

Senator MUSKIE. We have, I think, four more witnesses, so we ought to proceed.

Our next witness this afternoon is Dr. Melvin W. First, associate professor, Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Kresge En

Professor First, I think we should have put you first on the schedule this afternoon.

STATEMENT OF DR. MELVIN W. FIRST, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, KRESGE ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH CENTER, HARVARD SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH

Dr. FIRST. At this point I feel like the filling of a John Collins sandwich. [Laughter.]

Senator MUSKIE. We are delighted to have you here and I appreciate your willingness to testify and contribute to this record which I think will be very important in supporting the legislation we are about to introduce.

Dr. FIRST. Thank you, Senator Muskie. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before this committee to present some of our findings on the current status of solid waste management in the United States and our conclusions regarding the course of future developments and objectives.

Harvard is not going to ask equal time with MIT. [Laughter.] In fact, I would like to skip some of the points that have already been covered adequately by the previous speakers, but I would like to offer my material in toto for the record with your permission.

Senator MUSKIE. The full text will appear in the record and you may highlight it in any way that you like."

MUNICIPAL WASTE MANAGEMENT

Dr. FIRST. Thank you. Although there are many serious problems associated with satisfactory disposal of industrial, agricultural, and demolition wastes, I would like to direct my comments primarily to municipal waste management.

INTRODUCTION

Solid wastes are commonly thought to be substances that have become worthless through degradation to unusable product but in the United States they may be substances which retain a significant monetary value that unfortunately is less than the salvage costs. As a result, the economy is doubly burdened: First, by the loss of residual values; and second, by the substantial costs associated with the collection and disposal by destruction or burial of useful but unwanted waste products. In less affluent parts of the world, solid waste disposal is less of an environmental health problem because the volume of wastes is very small.

I recall, clearly, motoring many hundreds of miles through China during World War II and being astonished by the complete absence of nails, bottles, tin cans, wood fragments, papers, or any other item of trash along the highway. In that deprived economy, no one could afford the luxury of discarding objects which had even a trivial residual utility. Those interested in solid waste management cannot avoid being impressed by current estimates of the magnitude of the problem.

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