At first, I couldn’t see it. Then one day it started peeking over the trees, greeting me as I made my way to my parents’ house for holidays and birthdays. I looked forward to seeing rows of crops and small businesses lining the highway, and the lights of the high school stadium where Nick Chubb and Sam Hunt once played. But now an unwelcomed roadside addition was rising boldly into the northwest Georgia sky. Eventually folks settled on a name for this emergent mass in Polk County: Mount Trashmore.
Back home in Atlanta, every rip of a bag, screech of Styrofoam and tear into my two-day deliveries was getting louder, alongside one nagging thought: Was my metro Atlanta trash growing that mountain taller? I began digging. I was stunned learning how much trash ends up in Georgia’s municipal solid waste landfills every year: more than 25 billion pounds. According to Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division, there are more than 40 of those active landfills in our state. The number in Fulton County: zero.
Credit: contributed
Credit: contributed
I decided to plot each one on an interactive, digital map, while noting their average daily tons and anticipated fill dates. Historically, you were likely to find city landfills in poor, often Black neighborhoods. Today, the trend is increasingly rural, increasingly privatized. My hometown landfill alone receives around 50,000 tons a month, roughly the weight of the Titanic. According to monthly reports, more than half comes from Fulton and Douglas counties, less than 10 percent from Polk.
Down the road from Mount Trashmore, you’ll spot cows and horses grazing. You’ll also pass the house of a woman named Hansley. In the early 1900s, her family built homes on land that now sits in the landfill’s shadow. It had been her childhood dream to grow old there. Now, she tells me she questions the near constant runoff and her invitations to visitors knowing the embarrassment that comes with the overbearing sight, sounds and smell. The landfill was permitted to reach 400 feet; that’s far taller than our state capital building and twice as high as the Acrophobia ride at Six Flags.
Much of the way we handle our trash hasn’t changed since the 1960s, according to Jay Bassett. He spent decades working for the Environmental Protection Agency and now supports local environmentally focused nonprofits. He told me federal regulations leave solid waste management largely up to states and local municipalities. For 30 years after they close, he says landfills are the responsibility of the owner and operator. After that, it can fall to Georgia taxpayers. For years, lawmakers used money generated from tipping fees charged by landfills for accepting waste to cover other state expenses. Only recently has that money been safeguarded for its intended use: to make sure decomposing waste doesn’t endanger our air, water or food.
Realistically, landfills aren’t going anywhere, but we should be putting as little in them as possible. Think: reduce, repair, reuse, recycle. Four simple words, one complex reality.
Across Georgia, it’s often cheaper to throw things in landfills than recycle, since our state maintains some of the lowest tipping fees in the country. That’s true in Polk County where there is no curbside recycling program. When cities do recycle, rules are often confusing or unknown and vary from town to town. Even if you get it right, your neighbors getting it wrong could contaminate the whole truck. In the city of Atlanta, for example, more than 25 percent of recycling ends up going into the landfill due to contamination.
We’re leaving money on the table every day we don’t figure this out. Thanks to carpets, cardboard and other remanufacturing, Georgia ranks as one of the top states for companies that rely on recycled materials. While we toss valuable resources in landfills, those companies are forced to look outside of Georgia to find enough quality, recycled feedstock to meet demand.
In my hunt to figure out how we can waste less and leave more for the next generation, I’ve discovered three examples that highlight what we’re getting right. First, the Center for Hard to Recycle Materials, or CHaRM. This drive-thru site accepts everything from plastics and paint, to TVs and textiles. Live Thrive, the nonprofit that runs CHaRM, works with partners that turn your Styrofoam into home insulation and tires into pothole filler. Next, there’s Atlo, a female-owned refillery. Inside their shipping container, you can make swaps to more sustainable options and refill your reusable jars with soaps and cleaners. Finally, a school-based program is equipping the next generation to divert methane-producing organics from landfills to grow food. Compost Connectors trains Georgia kids to pick up otherwise uneaten scraps from the cafeteria and turn them into rich soil for their school gardens.
As I dig deeper into these stories and stats, I’m left wondering if it will matter; if that mountain of trash will move anyone. What can we all do that will truly make a difference?
Let me leave you with two suggestions: First, start with one new habit; whether that’s taking reusable bags to the store, composting at home, or making sure your city-accepted recycling is clean, dry and loose. Second: find out where your trash goes and how much is actually being recycled. Ask your city and elected leaders. Demand transparency.
Despite what you see on TV, your junk doesn’t magically disappear. And as our state’s landfills fill up and close, we will have to decide – where will our trash go next?
Jennifer Camacho is an Atlanta-based communications professional. She does some work with the nonprofit Food Well Alliance, which runs the Compost Connectors program.
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