In Ames Holiday Recyclables Find a Job in the Trash

When visitors come to Ames throughout the holiday season they might wonder why a college town like Ames lacks a municipal curbside recycling program, but city staff would say Ames has been recycling since 1975.

“Our garbage has a job,” said Lorrie Hanson, a secretary at the Resource Recovery Plant.

With the exception of a few items there's no need to sort trash here. The Resource Recovery Plant has turned garbage into power for 37 years.

All the county's garbage is piled high and thrown into a grinder that rips open the bags and compacts trash to the size of footballs and then golfballs. A magnet pulls out the metal and another conveyer picks out the metal that doesn't stick to a magnet. Scrap metals are sold and burnable trash, like paper, cardboard and plastics, travel through a tube to the Ames power plant where it's mixed with coal to power Ames. The plant calls the processed trash, Refuse Derived Fuel.

The trash or RDF and coal are burned in a boiler at about 2800 degrees, so that harmful dioxins are not created, Hanson said.

Every ton of refuse fuel that's created reduces CO2 emissions by a ton and reduces coal use by a quarter ton, according to the city.

Each year, the plant collects about 53,000 tons of trash and turns 36,000 tons of that into fuel for the power plant and sends about 14,000 tons of trash to a landfill, Hanson said.

The refuse fuel is burned along with coal, which Hanson said, reduces sulfur dioxide emissions.

A 2010 article in the New York Times said such plants are becoming popular in Europe but haven't caught on in the United States because of their negative perception especially from environmental groups.

Hanson said people who recycle should ask themselves where those recyclables go. In most cases they are collected and shipped off to other regions of the country or globe, she said.

“Does it make sense to use fossil fuels to move materials to be ultimately --- we hope --- recycled, or to put it on one vehicle and use it here,” Hanson said.

Ames built the plant after realizing in the early 1970s that their landfill on the east side of town would be full by 1979. Arnold Chantland, a mechanical engineer, visited a similar plant in Saint Louis in the early 1970s and decided to try the RDF process here, which was an easy step since the city owned its power plant and didn't have to work with private companies, Hanson said.

Today Ames recycles its trash into power and sends the leftovers --- ash, grit and wet stuff --- to a landfill in Boone County.

What shouldn't go into the trash:

Liquids: Liquids like milk, juice, pop and even ice should be dumped out before it goes into the garbage.

Chemicals: The Resource Recovery Plant allows free drop off of hazardous chemicals on Wednesdays.

Fluorescent bulbs and compact fluorescent bulbs: They contain small amounts of mercury and should be delivered to the Resource Recovery Plant separately.

Propane Containers: They could blow up in the Recovery Plants' machines.

Glass: Container glass recycling bins are located at most grocery stores. If glass is thrown in the trash it eats away at the facility's grinders. Glass is recycled for sandblasting, landscaping materials and concrete mixes.

Batteries: Alkaline batteries can go into the trash all others should be recycled or dropped off separately at the Resource Recovery Plant.

Waste Oil: The plant will take up to five gallons of waste oil free.

Christmas Trees: They are considered yard waste and should be delivered to the Ames Park & Recreation site on 13^th Street.