close
close

Toxic ‘waste juice’ a problem at 4 NH landfills, including Rochester

Waste in and around the landfill. Waste outside the permitted area. Release of liquid pollution. Failure to submit mandatory reports.

These are some of the problems found at four of the state’s active landfills, documented in deficiency letters sent from January through June by the Department of Environmental Services. Many of the problems revolved around the management of leachate, the “waste juice” created when rainfall mixes with waste that can be highly toxic.

One of those facilities, a subsidiary of Vermont-based Casella Waste Systems, failed hundreds of times to maintain leachate at required levels and submit required reports, data and studies to the state, according to a June letter from DES.

That same company is trying to overcome local opposition to build a landfill half a mile from a lake in the small North Country town of Dalton, about a 20-minute drive from Bethlehem, the town of 2,500 where the current landfill, North Country Environmental Services, is located.

Other landfills that received letters this year include Rochester, operated by Waste Management New Hampshire; Conway, operated by the city; and Lebanon, operated by the city.

Jeff Weld, a spokesman for Casella, told the Bulletin that the problems outlined by DES were “unacceptable” and that Casella would conduct a “significant investigation” into their root causes. He also said that the problems were “not representative” of the company’s “expectations for operational excellence” but that they posed “no potential harm” to people or the environment.

“We immediately implemented a number of operational improvements to reduce leachate generation at the site,” Weld said, “while also expanding the number of wastewater treatment and transportation companies available to assist in managing the site’s wastewater.”

Spokespeople for the Rochester and Lebanon landfills said the problems had been addressed. A representative for the Conway landfill did not respond to requests for comment.

Casella has been the subject of public criticism during the years-long battle to build a new landfill in Dalton. It has also been criticized previously for its management of the Bethlehem facility.

In 2021, 154,000 gallons of leachate overflowed from the plant, possibly the largest spill in state history. According to Weld, the company did not believe the spill extended beyond a surface water reservoir at the landfill.

In 2022, Casella paid $50,000 to settle a federal Clean Water Act lawsuit brought by environmental groups that alleged the dump polluted the Ammonoosuc River, which borders the facility. The company maintains it did nothing wrong.

The DES letter, sent in June, detailed problems dating back to last summer.

“Please be aware that the storage of leachate on the liner at the depth and frequency that currently available data suggests is a significant problem,” DES wrote to the facility. “When this occurs, it is the responsibility of NCES to identify and correct the problem as quickly as possible.”

That quote stood out to Amy Manzelli, an attorney with BCM Environmental & Land Law who represents North Country Alliance for Balance Change, a group that opposes the Dalton landfill and advocates for solid waste issues.

“When the department explicitly editorializes on an issue,” she said, “and identifies it as a, quote, an important issue, end of quote, that really jumps out as a red flag that this is an extremely important, important issue.”

There are many problems

A letter of deficit is “the average level” of enforcement action that DES can take, Manzelli explained. The letters received by at least four landfills this year contain a collection of problems.

The city-run Lebanon landfill had spill outbreaks in 13 areas, including five spills outside the facility and into the environment, according to a letter DES sent in April. The facility did not immediately notify DES as required, and at least some of the issues were not addressed in a “timely manner,” the letter said.

DES also observed “large amounts of waste” inside and outside the landfill’s footprint. A 2023 assessment of the facility, which DES said it received in March, found that waste was being placed outside of permitted vertical boundaries.

Christopher Kilmer, assistant public works director for Lebanon, said the city has been working to address the violations.

“We have been working diligently with New Hampshire DES to return to a level of compliance that we had previously achieved,” Kilmer said.

In Rochester, a landfill operated by Waste Management of New Hampshire had at least 13 leachate discharges between late December 2022 and late April of this year, according to a May letter from DES. The number of incidents during that period represents “an ongoing operational issue at the facility,” DES wrote.

During three site visits since December 2022, the facility was found to have “failed on all three occasions” to meet requirements to cover waste at the end of each working day, DES said.

DES also stated that it had not been notified, as required, of the elevated levels of leachate at the facility.

Garrett Trierweiler, the company’s director of public affairs, said in an email that Waste Management “has complied with all requirements of the action plan as stated” and that it will work with DES on future issues.

In January, a landfill in Conway received an amended deficiency letter because an issue identified in August 2022 had not been addressed. Additional issues were also discovered during a site visit in October.

The problem that had not been resolved was that access to the complex was not properly restricted. During the recent site visit, DES staff saw that the main entrance was already open before the operator arrived to open the complex for the day.

DES also observed uncovered and improperly covered waste at the landfill. The facility also dumped liquid waste, which is prohibited, the letter said. It also failed to file necessary reports on leachate.

In a February response to DES, the city said the unauthorized waste would “no longer be deposited” at the facility until “it meets testing requirements.” It also confirmed that the gate would be closed when the facility was not open and that the city would report leachate rates as required.

Andrew Smith, the city’s public works director, was not available for comment.

‘The Titanic’

In Bethlehem, Casella committed hundreds of offenses, mostly by repeating the same offenses over and over again.

In its letter, DES said the facility has not been operating “in a manner that controls leachate production to the greatest extent possible,” the standard required by state regulations. In fact, it has produced — and therefore had to pump out — millions of gallons more leachate in recent months than it did at the beginning of last year.

Pumps pull leachate from the liner, where it flows through pipes and into a holding tank before being transported from the facility for treatment, said Weld, the Casella spokesman. These systems are “redundant,” he said, to prevent leachate from leaking into the environment: dual liners, pipes within pipes and tanks within secondary tanks.

From the second half of 2021 to the first half of 2023, the landfill pumped out as much as 2.8 million gallons of leachate per quarter, or every four months. That skyrocketed from the second half of 2023 to the beginning of this year, with leachate pumping out as much as 5.2 million gallons per quarter.

Landfills must also have systems in place “that prevent more than 12 inches” of leachate from accumulating on the liner,” said Leah McKenna, administrator of the DES Solid Waste Management Bureau.

In 450 cases between July 2023 and June of this year, the Bethlehem facility failed to maintain leachate at required levels. In one recent case, that level was 116.42 inches, or nearly 10 times higher than the required maximum.

The facility must keep leachate below that level, even “up to the 25-year, 24-hour storm event,” the letter said. “Precipitation data in the (facility) quarterly reports,” DES wrote, “indicates that there were no storm events that exceeded the 25-year/24-hour storm.”

The landfill also failed to file reports and investigation reports when leachate entered the collection system at a rate that would have triggered such notifications to the state. Those exceedances occurred 726 times.

McKenna, the DES official, said Casella had submitted the items the department requested in response to the letter. Not all of those documents had been made public through the department’s online system as of Thursday morning, though McKenna said they would be soon.

McKenna said she could not comment on possible open enforcement actions, but DES wrote to facilities that failure to comply with the letters “may result in a formal administrative action.”

Andrea Bryant is a retired school teacher with 35 years of experience. She lives on an 80-acre parcel of land bordering a state park and forest, and about a mile from the landfill.

“I should be in silence and purity,” she said. “And I am not.”

The smells and sounds of the dump travel to her home. The sounds wake her most days at 7 a.m. And often, she said, she is “pushed into the house” by “a wave of stench.”

“It ruined my life,” she said, dividing her city as it built and expanded.

Bryant was not surprised by the state’s letter outlining the hundreds of violations. The company is “doing what they want to do,” she said. She said she was “pleased” with the list of violations, “because it’s high time they were held accountable.”

Bryant and others who opposed the landfill expansion had long suspected problems would arise.

“We used to call it the Titanic,” she said.

This story was originally published by the New Hampshire Newsletter.