A committee tasked with finding a new site to house Oahu’s garbage is expanding its search six months after its first meeting.
The Mayor’s Advisory Committee on Landfill Site Selection decided Tuesday to ask the Board of Water Supply whether there are any other potential locations than the 47 sites it began exploring in January, roughly 10 of which are considered serious contenders.
The committee is charged with finding an alternate site to the current Waimanalo Gulch Sanitary Landfill, whose permit expires next year.
The 12 members appointed by the mayor expected Tuesday to begin ranking a list of 20 criteria that will determine the best locations. But that’s been delayed until they confirm that there are no other sites that have been overlooked and don’t threaten to contaminate groundwater.
If new sites are identified it could delay the process.
But the pressure to find a new landfill site may have waned with recent news that the city had requested that a July 2012 deadline for Waimanalo Gulch to stop accepting solid waste be stricken from a 2008 Land Use Commission ruling. That, in effect, would extend the life of the landfill, which has more than 90 acres that can be used.
It’s expected to take seven to 10 years to develop a new landfill, a detail which the Department of Environmental Services said requires the appeal, which is currently under review by the Department of Planning and Permitting.
Eventually, the committee will begin ranking a set of complicated criteria that includes such metrics as wind direction, proximity to homes, schools and parks, cost, traffic considerations and environmental and cultural concerns.
The same process took place in 2003, and after an exhaustive review that committee determined that the Waimanalo landfill was the best location.
This time the committee is not allowed to include the Waimanalo landfill.
