The physical layout, size and design of a transfer station heavily influences both the scope and ease of operations within that facility. If the incoming volume surpasses the capacity of a facility, or the facility is no longer conducive for processing the materials coming through the door, it could be time to weigh the benefits of redesigning, expanding or building a new site altogether.

According to Evan Williams, who is in charge of project design at design-build specialist Cambridge Companies, there are a number of factors business owners should consider when deciding on what route might be best for enhancing the capabilities of their operations.

When does it make sense to build?

Williams says that an increase in volume can signal a clear need for facility expansion or redesign. Increases in volume commonly arise from taking on new customers or diversifying the materials the facility processes. In these cases, improving capacity often becomes a must in order to stay competitive and continue serving customers’ needs.

“When it comes to renovating or expanding a facility, it [usually boils down to either expanding the volume or changing the mix] of materials,” Williams says. “Some transfer stations receive municipal solid waste and they might innovate and renovate their facility so they can receive single-stream recyclables that might otherwise get transferred to another facility.”

Other reasons to consider upgrading a transfer station include issues with odor or dust and subsequent environmental compliance regulation; structural deficiencies that need to be fixed to maintain safe operation; or the desire to better separate different streams such as white goods, organics and construction and demolition materials within the facility.

Williams says a redesign or expansion might also be required if there is a change in a site’s incoming vehicles or use of equipment.

“[Facilities might also be renovated or expanded] to receive a particular type of compactor or to accommodate a larger type of trailer,” Williams says. “I know some transfer stations are going away from the more traditional 53-foot empty box trailers to the newer chip trailers to handle more volume. Other operators might want to switch out their existing wheel loader for a material handler with a grapple and need more ceiling clearance, for example. … In these cases, an operator may say, ‘Hey, what we’re doing now isn’t working. We need to improve it. So, what is the next step?’”

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Determining next steps

Williams says that once operators determine there is a need to upgrade or expand a facility, decision-makers should go through a strategic process to help figure out what the best solution is.

Scoping and programming phase

In the scoping and programming phase, Williams says stakeholders should both look at current operations and envision how operations may change in the future to chart a course for a site’s redevelopment or expansion.

“When you go through a scoping and programing phase, you look at all of your appropriate options,” he says. “First of all, you look at your operations to evaluate what you’re doing to confirm what you’re doing well and where your shortcomings are. Then, you have to look into the future and determine where you want to be 5, 10, 15, 20 years down the road—you have to figure out what is on the horizon and what you see your business looking like then. You’d hate to renovate or modify your building to accommodate what you’re doing right now when in a few years, there could be a dramatic change.”

Williams says business owners can undertake this process in house or consult with a third-party builder or design-build firm to think about how future operational changes might warrant certain building modifications.

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Idea of cost

Of course, a business must figure out what it can afford before ground can be broken on a building project. Once business owners determine what they want and need from a redesigned or newly built transfer station, they can ascertain whether this is feasible from a financial standpoint.

“During the planning process, you can assess your budget numbers through a very rough order of magnitude, you’re talking within 20 percent, but you want to have an idea of what you can spend,” Williams says. “You don’t want to spend a lot of time and money on detailed design and come up with a figure that is just way outside of what you can spend. So, you have to keep the budget top of mind as an integral part of this exercise.”

Define your strategy

After a business owner plots out what they want from a build perspective and they determine what their budget will be, they can determine whether or not they can renovate their existing space, add on to their existing space, or build an entirely new facility.

Williams says owners should consider if the changes they want to make will allow the company to safely and comfortably operate within the confines of the existing site during construction, if adjacent property may need to be acquired or if a new location will have to be procured.

"You have to figure out what is on the horizon and what you see your business looking like then. You’d hate to renovate or modify your building to accommodate what you’re doing right now when in a few years, there could be dramatic change,” –Evan Williams, project design specialist at Cambridge Companies

Beyond the cost of building a new structure, Williams says that stakeholders must weigh what the cost will be if operations are impeded during construction inside an existing facility.

“When you’re looking at modifying your existing facility and you’re planning on potential growth or expansion, you need to plan those building interventions with an eye on, ‘Can this be built while the existing facility is operating and can we do this so work is not impacted?’” Williams says. “There’s a fair amount of coordination that may or may not need to be done with respect to the facility to support existing operations if you’re going to continue work while building.”

Williams says that although it might seem like renovating an existing facility may be less expensive than building new, the reality of total cost might favor new builds in many circumstances.

“In many ways, renovating can look cost-effective at the start, but the total cost can be more expensive because you basically have to pay to tear something out and pay to put it back in,” he says. “So, if at the end of the day, the total project costs including downtime end up being more than just building a whole new facility on a greenfield site or even on the existing site, that can definitely have an impact. The other way that building a new site would make sense is if it’s just not practical to be shut down for an extended period for renovations. If you don’t have other transfer stations in the marketplace you can send material to and you’re either going to have to pay to ship that a long distance to landfill or send it to a competitor’s transfer station, and neither of those situations are appealing based on the duration of the project and the fact you might be incurring those costs, building new might be the most sensible option.”

Despite these realities, Williams notes that if a facility can coordinate a site rebuild in stages without detrimentally impacting work, this can make sense for some owners.

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Finding the right team

Williams says that once a comprehensive plan is in place, operators should ensure they’re vetting potential contractors who can best meet their construction needs. Although any number of builders can design and construct a transfer station, experience matters when it comes to functionality and structural integrity.

“You’re going to want to be partnering with a design and/or a design-build company that has extensive experience in the industry. This isn’t meant to be disparaging or negative, but any engineer is technically able to draw [what a facility] is going to look like and they’ll be able to put lines on paper and show where concrete needs to go and the like, but the reality is they’re not going to know some of the approaches and practices to make these buildings hold up better in the long term,” Williams says. “So, what you’re doing when you go to somebody who doesn’t have experience, you’re basically paying for them to get the experience the hard way by your project being the guinea pig. To a certain extent, people that have a lot of experience in the industry, they’ve already made their mistakes, and they know what they need to be doing to get you the results that you want.”

Beyond the ability to design and build a structurally sound facility, Williams says that experienced teams can offer advice and solutions to an organization’s pain points that the business owner might not have thought of previously.

“You might have in your head an idea of what you want or what you need for an expansion. But when you bring someone in with a wealth of experience, they can give you some other ideas that maybe you hadn’t considered. … You want to bring the best people in so that you get the best project results possible, but you also want to get as many options on the table as possible,” Williams says. “You might bring in a company and they have 15 different layout options. You might not end up using all this advice, and that’s fine, but at least you have those options.”

The author is the editor of Waste Today magazine and can be reached at aredling@gie.net.

The ubiquitous presence of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) and their potential to have negative effects on human and aquatic health continue to be leading topics across the United States as more research is gathered to develop a broad body of scientific knowledge.

There are currently two or three major pathways of thought regarding the risk to human health and the environment. There are agencies that have adopted a highly conservative approach to new PFAS regulation and emphasize evidence of significant health impacts such as gastrointestinal system colitis, high cholesterol, abnormal fat metabolism, liver damage, high blood pressure and cancer. Other agencies have taken a wait-and-see approach as the body of knowledge grows, and still others have contested the science used to develop the proposed standards citing research that shows no links between cancer and PFAS.

Research into the subject continues at a fevered pace. While this is a nationwide issue, to give an idea of the efforts regionally underway in the coastal Southeast (including select federal efforts), here is a digest of actions and initiatives ongoing and upcoming in Florida, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia.

Federal: As of Feb. 20, the U.S. EPA is proposing regulatory determinations for perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) and perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA) in drinking water. The EPA is seeking public comment on its proposed regulatory determinations for eight contaminants listed on the fourth Contaminant Candidate List. The agency is proposing to regulate two contaminants, PFOS and PFOA.

Florida: The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) has derived provisional groundwater and soil cleanup levels and proposed surface water standards for PFAS due to its chemical composition that leads to an elevated environmental presence. This chemical composition also makes remediation difficult. This work is generated from scientific research by the University of Florida, and the FDEP is actively investigating historic use and impacts to drinking water sources.

Georgia: The state is actively investigating drinking water sources in the city of Summerville in relation to the Raccoon Creek Treatment Plant. This is in relation to elevated PFOA and PFOS levels.

South Carolina: The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (DHEC) is focusing on oversight of possible contaminant sources such as Department of Defense (DOD) facilities. In January, the state conducted groundwater sampling of wells which serve communities near Shaw Air Force Base in Sumter, South Carolina. Additionally, development of a strategy for further evaluation of PFAS in drinking water is underway.

North Carolina: On Feb. 5, the North Carolina PFAS Testing Network published, “Assessing the effectiveness of point-of-use residential drinking water filters for perfluoroalkyl substances (PFASs).” There is ongoing advanced early monitoring with a statewide PFAS sampling and monitoring network of both air and drinking water. DEQ and DHHS are seeking involvement by the EPA on the health effects of these emerging contaminants. Incidentally, as of March 18, all testing and sample collection by the network has been halted until further notice due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Virginia: On March 2, the Virginia legislature unanimously adopted a bill for Virginia to study the occurrence of PFOA, PFOS and PFAS in the state’s public drinking water and develop recommendations for specific maximum contaminant levels. This legislation is awaiting signature by the governor on or before April 11.

At this point, it is anyone’s guess what pathway states will commit to to fight PFAS; however, it is my hope that legislators and administrators will fairly weigh economic, health, environmental and social impacts and continue to think about actions that can be taken upstream, not just downstream. As solid waste managers, we will do our part to contain, manage and mitigate the PFAS issue to the best of our abilities—and we will work with our state and federal colleagues to do so. PFAS do not originate in the waste and recycling streams, but we need to address it by pushing for proper management both before and after the point of disposal. This must stay top of mind for legislators as well as the solid waste management industry as a whole.

Of the 268 million tons of municipal solid waste (MSW) generated in 2017, 139 million tons was sent to landfill, according to a report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

Luckily with this incoming volume, gone are the days of the town dump. Today’s landfills are using greener methods to safely cover waste; generate energy from the underground methane gases; and give a second life after closure in the form of nature preserves, golf courses and even amphitheaters.

The number of landfills in the U.S. has dropped from 7,600 in the early 1980s to less than 2,000 today due to stricter land use regulations and a swell in recycling. Those that remain, however, are increasing in size.

"That size of machine is crucial to us. At a landfill this large, you need to move material quickly,” –David Strayer, assistant ops manager, Lycoming County Landfill

Lycoming County Resource Management Services operates a 500-acre site in north central Pennsylvania that includes a landfill, material recovery facility and recycling center. The landfill comprises 100 acres of the property. When opened in 1978, the landfill averaged 16,689 tons of MSW annually. Today, it receives 1,100 tons daily of MSW, including food scraps, product packaging, clothing, bottles, newspapers and other common household items that consumers do not recycle.

After waste, the second chief component of landfills is commonly dirt and shale, both of which are in abundance at the Lycoming County Landfill. For this reason, the landfill’s operators use shale and crushed rock from the site to build and maintain roadways to dumping areas and pad and cover the landfill’s underground cells.

A landfill cell is a complex creature. Each cell at the Lycoming County Landfill is approximately 10-square acres. The bottom of these cells are lined with geotextile matting and three feet of protective stone. Next, several layers of clay are compacted over the rock, and then a plastic cell liner is spread over the open cell before any waste is added. To further prevent groundwater contamination, PVC piping is latticed across the cell to collect leachate and funnel it to nearby lagoons. When filled, rock, soil and clay are used to cap and close the cells, then they are reseeded and returned to undisturbed grassland.

“It’s nice to be able to supply our own stone,” David Strayer, assistant operations manager at the Lycoming County Landfill, says. “That is not a resource most landfills have available. We have a very hard vein of blue shale at our pit, and since we are in close proximity to [populated] areas, we cannot blast. Instead, we use an excavator with a hammer or single shank ripper to break it into slabs that we can run through our crusher and screen to the right size. We have a McCloskey C50 jaw crusher as well as a Screen Machine Spyder 516T and a Finlay 833 screen plant that allow us to produce stone from a powder—size 3/8-inch-minus up to 8- or 6-inch-minus rock for roads.”

A Volvo L350F wheel loader is the landfill’s flagship machine to shuttle shale from the pit to the two on-site crushers or load its fleet of five Volvo articulated haulers. The 10-yard-cubed face loader, which is the largest in the Volvo lineup, is powered by a 16-liter, 532 horsepower Volvo engine.

According to Strayer, the L350F is one of the most important pieces of equipment the team employs since it is large enough to handle the requirements the site’s operators demand of it.

“That size of machine is crucial to us,” Strayer says. “At a landfill this large, you need to move material quickly and this size of loader paired with the Volvo 40-ton haul trucks allow us to do that with less wear and tear on the equipment, less waiting time to load and, ultimately, less stress on your operator.”

The right equipment is critical for maintaining the scope of the landfill’s operations, which is why the team at Lycoming County thoroughly vets each new purchase before making the investment.

When Lycoming County Resource Management Services needs to supplement its fleet, it turns to its local Volvo dealer based out of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Highway Equipment & Supply. Brian Hoffman, territory sales manager for Highway Equipment & Supply, has guided Lycoming County through multiple machine purchases using governmental buying contracts.

“We are obligated to follow certain buying regulations,” Jason Yorks, director at Lycoming County Resource Management Services, says. “If we go out to a straight bid, there’s a good chance that while we may save a few thousand dollars, in the long run, it is not cheaper if the equipment does not give you the value, service and life you expect. We are particular. We want a loader that will last a long time with good fuel efficiency. That is why we used the COSTARS cooperative purchasing program to buy the L350. Through COSTARS we can select from a list of equipment with pre-negotiated pricing through a state contracting system.”

COSTARS, while specific to Pennsylvania, is one of numerous state and federal buying contracts that are becoming an attractive alternate to the traditional bid process for government customers, Hoffman says.

Tom Schanz, state and provincial government sales manager for Volvo, says municipal customers should consider the benefits of state buying contracts because of the purchasing power they allow.

“COSTARS is the commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s state contract or ‘cooperative purchasing’ program. The Department of General Services administers the contract with the intention of providing a channel for procurement that can be swift while also making it simple to seek out approved vendors with vetted best pricing,” Schanz says. “There are state programs similar to COSTARS across the U.S. The state takes the lead in vetting vendors as well as their pricing so that entities throughout the state, which could be anything from municipalities to educational institutions, have the purchasing power of much larger entities.”

According to Kathy Tedone, governmental buying specialist for Volvo Construction Equipment, the company’s partners are increasingly relying on these contracts to get the most value from their purchases.

“Volvo is seeing a significant and consistent increase in the trend by our municipal partners to purchase from cooperative contracts,” Tedone says. “These contracts offer the flexibility to purchase equipment that meets their specific needs at the most competitive pricing available while saving time and money.”

While cooperative contracts are one way for the Lycoming County Landfill to save money, the site’s operators work to conserve resources whenever possible. Lycoming County has an on-site gas-to-energy plant where methane gas is repurposed from the decomposing waste, an ample resource since food waste remains the largest type of unrecovered material sent to landfills. At the site, wells are sunk into the cells to siphon off gases to an on-site facility where the methane powers four generators that produce approximately 50 million kilowatt-hours per year, preventing the equivalent of 34,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually.

The Lycoming landfill has sufficient capacity to accept waste through at least 2030, and according to the site’s operators, it is working to ensure that its operations are as efficient and self-sustaining as possible in its remaining years. While the industry has come a long way since the days of the town dump, Yorks notes that preserving and maximizing landfill space will always be a priority.

“People are changing their habits; you no longer see burning barrels in backyards,” says Yorks. “Still, over 70 percent of the total volume of material we receive is MSW. While every facility across the Pennsylvania, and the United States, is seeing a drop in total waste produced, the reality is there will always be a need for a landfill.”

This article was provided courtesy of Volvo Construction Equipment.

The first case of the COVID-19 virus in the U.S. was diagnosed on Jan. 20. By March 26, the United States became the epicenter of the pandemic as domestic cases surpassed those in China and Italy for the first time. In the process, the steady uptick of domestic infections set in motion the nationwide closure of countless businesses and schools, cancelation of travel, and shelter in place orders.

As life has abruptly been put on hold for many Americans, waste and environmental services professionals have been called on to help deal with shifting solid waste collection demands, suddenly unpredictable volumes and the emergency need for decontamination services.

Managing medical and pharmaceutical waste

Selin Hoboy, vice president of government affairs and compliance at Bannockburn, Illinois-based Stericycle, says that the virus has altered the makeup of its incoming medical waste stream. Although the company is seeing some higher volumes from hospitals combating the disease, the delay in elective procedures and enforcement of stay-and-home ordinances has helped balance out the overall demand.

“We’re seeing some increase in medical waste produced due to heightened use of personal protective equipment (PPE) in diagnosing and treating COVID-19 patients, and some non-traditional waste is also sometimes being managed as regulated medical waste,” Hoboy says. “However, increases in waste from COVID-19 may be offset by continued declines of elective surgeries or temporary closures of smaller healthcare practices. The impact of the pandemic is changing day to day and hour to hour, and we are closely monitoring the situation with federal, state and local agencies to determine next steps.”

Hoboy says that medical waste from COVID-19 patients and workers is managed as Category B waste. This means that once it is discarded, it is to be treated as normal regulated medical waste that is subject to the same treatment and disposal guidelines as most other potentially infectious medical waste.

"We’re seeing some increase in medical waste produced due to heightened use of personal protective equipment in diagnosing and treating COVID-19 patients, and some non-traditional waste is also sometimes being managed as regulated medical waste,” –Selin Hoboy, vp of government affairs and compliance, Stericycle

Although the waste is treated the same and rendered innocuous through standard medical waste treatment methods, Hoboy says that the company has changed its protocols for hospital waste collections to minimize the risk of workers coming into contact with patients who are potentially infected.

“We have updated protocols and procedures for in-hospital services. For example, Stericycle service technicians will not be entering any patient isolation rooms regardless of isolation room signage, and technicians will be checking in at nurses’ stations to ask about any rooms they should not be entering,” Hoboy says. “Additionally, our team members are authorized to deny pickup of non-conforming waste from our customers who are not following our waste acceptance protocols or packaging guidelines.”

Hoboy says because of the rapidly changing nature of the virus, forecasting labor requirements is challenging, but that the company is able to add additional shifts for its workers and expand capacity if necessary.

Bob Cappadona, president and COO of Boston-based Veolia North America, says that the demand for the company’s services relative to COVID-19 has varied depending on the client.

“The core of our work [relating to COVID-19] has been at organizations that are involved in research,” he says. “A very significant group of customers for us is the pharmaceutical and biotechnology sector … and in some cases, we’re working at some of the key companies that are doing COVID-19 research. [And these customers] are looking for additional manpower support from us. They’re extremely busy with the research work that they’re doing in pursuit of therapies and cures. So, as we’ve reached out to our customers, they’ve wanted assurances that we’re going to be there for them, and we’ve signed a lot of emergency response-type agreements and support agreements for these companies.”

Conversely, due to the number of businesses being suddenly shut down across the country, Cappadona says some of Veolia’s smaller medical service clients have seen volumes decline.

“If you’re looking at the total spectrum of those who generate waste and ship it to us, half of them are very busy and half of them are closed. Many of the medical waste customers that ship into our facilities will be a family physician, a dentist or various types of clinics. And many of these facilities have closed or slowed considerably, so our level of activity with this group may be down. And then in some of the larger facilities, we may see slight volume increases, but at this point we haven’t seen anything dramatic,” Cappadona says.

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Decontamination nation

As evidenced by the increased demand for cleaning products and the shortage of available hand sanitizers at retailers from coast to coast, sanitation and decontamination are top of mind for many Americans. This is especially true for locations and businesses that have, or suspect to have, come into contact with those carrying the virus.

Currently, Cappadona says Veolia is providing industrial decontamination services mostly for its core clients, but is able to heed the call to serve a larger demographic through its nationwide emergency response group should the need arise.

US Ecology CEO Jeff Feeler says that his company has seen a 500 percent increase in demand for its decontamination services over the latter half of March due to COVID-19 concerns.

“We are currently providing decontamination services for a wide variety of public and private sector customers across the U.S., including retailers and pharmacies, cruise lines, airlines, schools, large industry, building services companies, government agencies and utilities,” Feeler says. “This service includes decontamination of sites that have had direct or potential exposure to the virus, or proactive preventative cleaning of high-traffic areas or frequently touched surfaces.”

Feeler says the Boise, Idaho-based company’s decontamination and preventative cleaning services include: wipe downs of horizontal surfaces and high-traffic/touchpoint areas; the use of portable fogger machines filled with decontamination solution for smaller areas; the use of a portable hydrogen peroxide disinfectant system for larger areas; and proper consolidation, transportation and disposal of all waste including used PPE.

While Feeler says the company’s estimated response times vary depending on several factors including volume of incoming calls, the company’s average response from receipt of initial calls to personnel arriving on-site has historically averaged from two to three hours. Even as demand increases along with the number of COVID-19 cases, Feeler says his team is prepared to meet the demand for its services.

“As the virus continues to spread and more businesses are facing the realities of long-term operational restrictions from local, state and federal regulators, they realize they must have a plan in place to safely resume day-to-day operations. … Our operations are staffed and equipped to handle multiple large-scale responses simultaneously. We have provided response services for nearly every major natural disaster and viral outbreak over the last two decades and are doing the same for COVID-19,” Feeler says.

Projecting more uncertainty

Waste management companies both big and small are working to adjust to shifting customer needs. If they haven’t experienced it already, many are anticipating the potential for significant shakeups in the form of increased residential waste volumes as more Americans are forced to stay in and work from home, a drop off in commercial and C&D volume amid massive businesses closures, and changes in medical waste volumes.

Stifel, St. Louis, released an industry update March 22 titled, “Solid Waste: Revising Models for C-19, Volume Down, Price Durable, Deal Flow Slows, FCF Stands Out.” In the update, the investment banking firm outlines the projected impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on solid waste industry participants.

“What public/private company avoids any sales pressure due to COVID-19? None,” the report states. “We believe the impact on solid waste will look like both 9/11 and the Great Recession. The former was a shock-and-awe [event], the consumer paused. The latter, the U.S./North American economies were over-levered, which it is not now, but wholesale business shutdowns had a volume impact. Today, solid waste has more control of cost/capital than ever before. Social distancing and big urban settings forcing closure of food, beverage, hospitality and entertainment leads to a big drop in collected volume and commercial customers asking for service on-hold/cancellations. We assume an annual 15 percent hit to volume of 10 percent for third-party commercial, C&D and special waste volume and 5 percent direct commercial collection sales cut in half for two months. Residential volumes will be up, and in many cases, contracts allow for charging for extra bin/bag pickups.”

A Republic Services spokesperson corroborated Stifel’s projections on anticipated escalations in residential volumes, stating that the Phoenix-based company is preparing for residential waste volumes to increase and is suspending bulk and yard waste pickup in some communities to be better prepared to service customers.

Janette Micelli, director of external affairs at Waste Management, says the Houston-based company has tried to take a proactive approach to adapt to changes in commercial volume.

“Customer needs are changing by the day—we’re all working diligently to right-size customers based on current volumes and provide them with the solutions they need to run their businesses,” Micelli says. “We are helping [some of] our customers reduce service appropriately, but also rapidly increase service for grocery stores, residential buildings and healthcare facilities. There’s no one-size-fits-all approach, so we are laser focused on meeting these evolving needs. … Our neighborhoods and businesses rely on us. Ultimately, our goal is to partner with our customers and do our part to provide some relief and help minimize the impact of the pandemic on their communities and businesses.”

Proper precautions

Despite the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO) not calling for any additional steps in handling MSW or recycling during the outbreak, some municipalities and haulers have altered their services in accordance with the spread of the virus.

There have been numerous reports of suspended curbside and drop-off recycling programs for both safety and demand reasons. Some MRFs have also temporarily halted operations due to safety concerns.

Micelli says that Waste Management has used the emergence of the virus as an opportunity to remind its workers of safety best practices.

“We instruct all employees handling any waste or recycling to follow our safety procedures, including wearing proper gloves and eye protection,” she says. “We’ve also created new procedures at our facilities to ensure social distancing and the elimination of group meetings. Employees not required to be on-site are working from home. As leaders in our highly regulated industry, we follow strict policies and procedures every day when managing solid waste, including medical waste, to protect our employees, our customers and the communities we serve.”

Similarly, Cappadona says that while little has changed in how its workers manage waste, the company has reemphasized its established safety protocols with staff to make sure workers are observing proper due diligence on the job.

“You assume that you need to protect yourself from [the virus]. So, that means not opening containers; ensuring that you’ve got appropriate PPE on whether that’s gloves, coveralls or respirators; and observing other general practices that we have in place. … We do an awful lot of total waste management programs where we go to a customer and we manage their medical waste, hazardous waste, radioactive waste, etc., which means our employees need to have hazard awareness. And with hazard awareness comes universal precautions of just making sure that you’re doing what’s called a mental safety assessment, which is where two or three seconds before you do something, you assess what the potential risks are and ensure that you have all the protections in place to manage that risk.”

Giving back

As you often see in times of crisis, the rise of COVID-19 cases in the U.S. hasn’t just brought challenges, it’s helped shine a light on those doing good within their companies and communities.

Waste Management CEO Jim Fish told the Wall Street Journal on March 22 that it would continue to pay workers for a 40-hour week regardless of whether services were cut or suspended, Republic Services says it is working to support local restaurants and thank its employees by providing meals to workers and their families from local establishments, and several companies such as Veolia are donating surgical masks to hospital workers in need.

Waste management and environmental services professionals don’t often get rewarded or recognized for the essential services they provide, but helping life go on as normal as possible for the communities in which they operate is something that merits attention. And even though the future might be clouded in uncertainty, organizations are working to maintain the status quo by showing up and coming together.

“This is something I don’t think any of us ever could have imagined,” Cappadona says. “So, [at Veolia] we’re trying to ensure that we’re helping people through the process of understanding what’s occurring and also providing a service that helps our customers as we all manage through this crisis together.”

The author is the editor of Waste Today and can be contacted at aredling@gie.net.