LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) - Lincoln officials have devised a new use for hail-damaged roof shingles: covering the old city dump.
The City Council is expected to vote Feb. 27 on a proposal to lift its ban on shingles at the North 48th Street site, which is used as a construction and demolition landfill.
Assistant public works director Donna Garden told the council this week that the shingles will help keep rainwater from flowing through the refuse and carrying potential pollutants into the groundwater, according to the Lincoln Journal Star (https://bit.ly/2llIVTX ). Old dumps weren’t required to be built with the liners now required as pollution barriers.
Garden said she didn’t know why the city had barred shingles from the dump.
About 15,000 tons of shingles go to the new Bluff Road Landfill each year, officials have said. Since the big May hailstorm, the city has processed 34,000 tons, which includes some stockpiled at the old dump in anticipation of the ordinance change. The city expects to receive hail-damaged shingles from the storm for 18 more months, Garden said.
It costs haulers $31.75 a ton to dispose of damaged shingles at the Bluff Road Landfill. Under the new ordinance lifting the ban at the old dump, damaged shingles could be dropped off at $4 a ton and be put to good use.
“We don’t believe there is any downside,” Garden told the council.
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Information from: Lincoln Journal Star, https://www.journalstar.com
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