WEBVTT - James Bradley on confronting Australia’s largest garbage dump 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:04.800 Hey there, Ruby Jones here every day on seven am. 0:00:04.840 --> 0:00:07.280 This week we're bringing you a long form story from 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:10.680 the monthly, read by the person who wrote it. Today 0:00:10.760 --> 0:00:14.120 we have author and critic James Bradley reading his piece 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:17.000 The Tipping Point. In it, he visits one of the 0:00:17.000 --> 0:00:21.079 country's largest landfill sites to understand the dangers in how 0:00:21.079 --> 0:00:23.880 we dispose of the millions of tons of waste that 0:00:23.920 --> 0:00:27.880 we create. In confronting something we often seek to avoid, 0:00:28.160 --> 0:00:31.720 the enormous waste of our modern lives, James examines the 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:36.080 nature of private consumption, its effects on the environment, and 0:00:36.120 --> 0:00:39.440 the lack of accountability baked into the system. It's a 0:00:39.479 --> 0:01:10.000 riveting piece. Enjoy It's Thursday, January nine. 0:01:04.200 --> 0:01:08.640 The Tipping Point. It's a bitterly cold day in July 0:01:09.160 --> 0:01:12.320 when I arrive at Cleanaway's Lucas Heights Resource Recovery Park 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:16.440 on Sydney's southern Edge. Standing in the car park, I 0:01:16.480 --> 0:01:19.160 stare at the huge hill that rises up behind it. 0:01:19.160 --> 0:01:22.759 Its sides a scree of pale rock and dirt. Thick 0:01:22.760 --> 0:01:25.600 black pipes snake here and there across its surface like 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:29.679 some outside watering system, while several hundred meters away, just 0:01:29.720 --> 0:01:32.480 over the crest of the hill. Heavy vehicles are bumping 0:01:32.480 --> 0:01:35.520 back and forth, their business concealed by mounds of earth. 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:40.119 The hill is the Lucas Heights Landfill. Locked away beneath 0:01:40.120 --> 0:01:43.640 its surface are tens of millions of tons of compacted garbage. 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:47.600 A decomposing mass of rubbish twenty five meters high, perhaps 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:51.960 a clomet along and not much less wide from here 0:01:52.360 --> 0:01:55.640 that seems difficult to credit. Apart from the dozens of 0:01:55.720 --> 0:01:59.160 ravens screeching overhead, there is little to suggest the presence 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:04.520 of so much waste. No smell, no tottering piles of rubbish. Instead, 0:02:04.520 --> 0:02:06.920 it looks more like a mine or a building site. 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:10.120 Inside the office beside the car park, I am introduced 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:13.840 to the landfill manager, Elsie Chaiang. He is a slim 0:02:13.919 --> 0:02:17.040 man in his fifties, with the aura of thoughtful calm. 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:20.000 I usually associate with somebody whose work involves taking time 0:02:20.080 --> 0:02:25.079 over things, an artisan or a farmer. Perhaps. Chiang started 0:02:25.120 --> 0:02:27.720 his career and waste in Hong Kong and began at 0:02:27.800 --> 0:02:31.120 Lucas Heights after moving to Australia in twenty eleven. While 0:02:31.120 --> 0:02:33.760 I put on my hard hat and florovest, he talks 0:02:33.800 --> 0:02:37.680 me through the facility's operations. Originally set up in nineteen 0:02:37.720 --> 0:02:41.240 eighty seven after the closure of the old Lucas Heights landfill, 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:45.320 it takes garbage from councils and businesses all over Southern Sydney, 0:02:45.840 --> 0:02:48.160 excepting not just the rubbish wheels stick in our red 0:02:48.160 --> 0:02:52.480 bins every week, but huge volumes of construction and commercial waste. 0:02:53.200 --> 0:02:55.440 This is borne in by a steady stream of trucks. 0:02:55.960 --> 0:02:58.359 As Chiang is speaking to me, several pass through the 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:01.120 gate outside the window, which wind their way up the 0:03:01.160 --> 0:03:03.880 hill towards the active area are glimpsed from the car park. 0:03:04.680 --> 0:03:07.600 These trucks deliver around three thousand tons of rubbish day, 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:12.200 or close to a million tons a year. Handling all 0:03:12.200 --> 0:03:16.120 that waste requires a lot of engineering. Modern landfills aren't 0:03:16.200 --> 0:03:19.440 just holes in the ground full of garbage. Their extremely 0:03:19.480 --> 0:03:24.840 sophisticated industrial operations subject to strict environmental controls. Here at 0:03:24.880 --> 0:03:27.880 Lucas Heights, for instance, the base of the landfall is 0:03:27.919 --> 0:03:30.280 lined with a two point five millimeter membrane of high 0:03:30.280 --> 0:03:34.120 density polyethylene, similar to the material used in plastic pipes 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:38.280 and bottles, over almost a meter of clay. This liner 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:40.800 is designed to prevent the highly toxic liquid that leaches 0:03:40.920 --> 0:03:44.560 out of the waste from contamining groundwater or migrating into 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:49.280 rivers and creeks. The top is also covered first with 0:03:49.320 --> 0:03:52.880 a three hundred millimeter thick intermediate deposit of rubble and dirt, 0:03:53.480 --> 0:03:57.200 and then, once the area has settled, a final layer 0:03:57.240 --> 0:04:00.440 of one point seven meters of soil, which will eventually 0:04:00.480 --> 0:04:05.040 be remediated into parkland or bush Even the active part 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:08.760 of the landfill, known as the face, is carefully managed 0:04:09.040 --> 0:04:11.520 and circled on every side with netting to catch anything 0:04:11.560 --> 0:04:16.360 that might blow away. Some sense of what that actually 0:04:16.400 --> 0:04:18.680 means can be gleaned from the diagram of the facility 0:04:18.720 --> 0:04:22.240 that's positioned on a stand in the office. Seen from above. 0:04:22.760 --> 0:04:24.680 The site is a bit over two kilometers from end 0:04:24.720 --> 0:04:28.000 to end and about half that across, and a regular 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:31.640 oval nestled in the middle of thick bushland. The active 0:04:31.680 --> 0:04:33.919 part of the facility is in the middle. At the 0:04:33.920 --> 0:04:36.520 southern end, a patch of green marks out the parts 0:04:36.560 --> 0:04:39.000 of the landfill that have been permanently covered and are 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:43.440 being rehabilitated into parkland or Near the northern perimeter, a 0:04:43.560 --> 0:04:46.360 huge pit that will eventually be filled with garbages being 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:50.680 prepared for lining. There is something more inspiring about the 0:04:50.680 --> 0:04:53.800 shear's scale of it, especially when one considers that Lucas 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:57.600 Heights isn't the only facility like this in Sydney. Bingo's 0:04:57.640 --> 0:05:01.559 Eastern Creek landfill is even bigger, says Theolia's Woodlawn Echo 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:05.000 Precinct near Canberra, which also accepts a lot of Sydney's waste, 0:05:05.560 --> 0:05:07.720 and they in turn are also only three of the 0:05:07.760 --> 0:05:11.960 almost thirteen hundred landfills scattered around the country. This isn't 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:16.280 just garbage. This is garbage's geological force, a tide of 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:21.360 rubbish so huge it almost defies comprehension. Most of us 0:05:21.360 --> 0:05:23.960 don't think about waste all that often, and when we do, 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:27.919 it's usually with discomfort and embarrassment. Waste is shunted to 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:31.160 the margins of our consciousness, both metaphorically and in a 0:05:31.240 --> 0:05:34.279 much more literal sense, ending up being shipped away to 0:05:34.320 --> 0:05:37.360 the outskirts of our cities and towns, and that goes 0:05:37.400 --> 0:05:41.120 double for landfill. Although many people get a warm glow 0:05:41.160 --> 0:05:43.680 out of recycling in the other forms of resource recovery, 0:05:44.080 --> 0:05:47.479 landfill is different. That's where the other stuff goes. The 0:05:47.520 --> 0:05:51.919 stuff we can't or more accurately, choose not to recover, 0:05:52.920 --> 0:05:56.159 and there's a lot of that stuff. Australia generates around 0:05:56.160 --> 0:05:59.240 seventy six million tons of waste a year, while a 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:01.599 bitter over sixty fears center that is recycled or recovered 0:06:01.640 --> 0:06:04.640 in some way Close to a third. More than twenty 0:06:04.720 --> 0:06:07.760 three million tons, almost a ton for every person in 0:06:07.839 --> 0:06:12.200 the country ends up in landfill. About thirty percent of 0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:17.320 this waste is organic material, food waste, garden waste, timber, 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:20.640 and other items, but it also incorporates large amounts of 0:06:20.720 --> 0:06:25.440 cardboard and paper, plastic, metal, building materials, glass, and soil 0:06:25.480 --> 0:06:31.040 contaminated with asbestos, chemicals or other hazardous wastes. As we 0:06:31.120 --> 0:06:34.080 wind up around the mound in a ute, Chiang points 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:36.839 out the jetsons like structure of the Lucas Heights Nuclear reactor, 0:06:36.880 --> 0:06:39.800 a complometer or so to the east. The southern half 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:42.400 of the landfill is inside the exclusion zone that surrounds 0:06:42.440 --> 0:06:46.520 the reactor, a conjunction that seems almost too neat. When 0:06:46.520 --> 0:06:49.120 I ask Chiang whether that worries him, he replies that 0:06:49.160 --> 0:06:51.360 it's a good thing because it means there's no chance 0:06:51.400 --> 0:06:53.280 of the land around that part of the facility being 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:57.240 zoned for housing. On the western slope, where the mound 0:06:57.279 --> 0:06:59.440 has been covered over and the ground drops away towards 0:06:59.480 --> 0:07:03.159 the bush land that surrounds the facility, grass grows, giving 0:07:03.200 --> 0:07:06.400 the space a bucolic feel. It is only slightly diminished 0:07:06.440 --> 0:07:10.080 by the network of snaking pipes. At the top of 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:13.320 the mound. We stop and climb out. Birds swirl overhead, 0:07:13.760 --> 0:07:16.440 hundreds of ravens, as well as great flocks of ibis 0:07:16.520 --> 0:07:20.640 moving in formation, seagulls and dozens of pelicans, all honking 0:07:20.680 --> 0:07:22.800 and shrieking as they fight for space to land amid 0:07:22.840 --> 0:07:26.120 the trucks in front of us, A line of orange 0:07:26.160 --> 0:07:28.760 flags and a black pipe mark the boundary of the grass. 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:32.440 Beyond them, the ground drops away into a shallow depression 0:07:32.840 --> 0:07:35.680 where huge trucks and bulldozers grind up and down through, 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:39.880 spilling piles of garbage. At one end, trucks are off 0:07:39.920 --> 0:07:43.720 loading bags and bags of rubbish, pouring out in great mounds. 0:07:44.680 --> 0:07:47.480 Once they've done that, one of several bulldozers bumps in 0:07:47.560 --> 0:07:51.240 and starts spreading it out, and finally, a massive, long 0:07:51.320 --> 0:07:54.720 bodied vehicle with sawtoothed wheels two or three meters in diameter, 0:07:55.360 --> 0:07:56.960 looking like it would be more at home in mad 0:07:57.040 --> 0:08:01.120 Macs grinds over the top the points on its wheels 0:08:01.160 --> 0:08:04.840 to compact the waste. While we stare at the trucks, 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:07.440 I try to make notes about the profusion of stuff 0:08:07.480 --> 0:08:09.720 spread out in front of me. There is almost too 0:08:09.800 --> 0:08:12.520 much to make sense of it. I can see tens 0:08:12.560 --> 0:08:15.840 of thousands of bags, many of them broken open, their 0:08:15.920 --> 0:08:19.160 contents spilling out. But I also spot broken furniture and 0:08:19.240 --> 0:08:21.920 bits of clothing that flap in the wind, as well 0:08:21.960 --> 0:08:26.280 as appliances and other less identifiable objects. There is a 0:08:26.320 --> 0:08:29.240 surprising number of splintered building paletts and what seems to 0:08:29.320 --> 0:08:32.040 be the framework for an entire wall, as well as 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:35.280 bundles of plastic taping unraveled from some building site delivery. 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:38.120 I asked Chayang what the weirdest thing he has ever 0:08:38.200 --> 0:08:41.240 found is. He says that the police often come looking 0:08:41.280 --> 0:08:44.360 for evidence of one kind or another, usually guns or clothing, 0:08:45.520 --> 0:08:49.839 never bodies, I ask, He smiles. In Hong Kong, I 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:51.679 did help the police look for a body, but we 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:55.680 couldn't find it. After a minute or two, I noticed 0:08:55.720 --> 0:08:59.120 the garbage seems to be moving. A curious seething motion 0:08:59.280 --> 0:09:02.439 rippling across the surface. At first I think it must 0:09:02.480 --> 0:09:05.120 be the bag shifting as they settle. Then I realize 0:09:05.120 --> 0:09:07.600 it's the birds scrambling here and there as the rubbish 0:09:07.640 --> 0:09:11.120 is spread and compacted, gobbling anything they can see. Do 0:09:11.160 --> 0:09:11.920 you get rats? 0:09:12.280 --> 0:09:12.720 I ask? 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:15.360 Chiang thinks for a moment and then shakes his head. 0:09:15.920 --> 0:09:20.280 Not really. There may not be rats, but it definitely smells, 0:09:20.760 --> 0:09:24.000 although far less than I expected to My untrained knows 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:25.800 the odour is similar to my red bin at home, 0:09:26.200 --> 0:09:30.440 a sharp, slightly unpleasant tang. This is a typical fresh 0:09:30.480 --> 0:09:33.840 waist smell, Chiang says, with a smile. The older waist 0:09:33.920 --> 0:09:36.720 has a different smell. How do they differ? I ask? 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:41.520 He shrugs. Older waiste is less good, more sour. All 0:09:41.600 --> 0:09:44.680 waste makes different smells. When we had the garden waist 0:09:44.760 --> 0:09:47.720 here a few years ago, that also generated a different odor. 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:51.520 Even well run landfills, such as Lucas Heights, produce odors, 0:09:52.160 --> 0:09:55.760 meaning smell is a constant concern for landfill operators, especially 0:09:55.800 --> 0:10:00.240 as cities small outwards. In twenty twenty two, Clean even 0:10:00.280 --> 0:10:03.200 Haul landfill site in Melbourne's West was fined twenty thousand 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:06.880 dollars over smell complaints. Residents spoke of not being able 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:09.280 to open their windows because of the stench, which one 0:10:09.320 --> 0:10:13.760 person described as like a rotten chemical, like a rotten stink, 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:18.360 like air freshener, but it's not right. Earlier this year, 0:10:18.800 --> 0:10:21.400 Bingo's subsidiary Dial Dump was fined two hundred and eighty 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:25.760 thousand dollars over persistent reports offensive smells emanating from its 0:10:25.880 --> 0:10:30.119 vast Eastern Creek landfill in Sydney's West. Even more problematic 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:33.160 are residents such as the underground fire at the Barrow 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:36.319 Group's Sunshine landfill in Melbourne's West, which broke out in 0:10:36.400 --> 0:10:40.800 twenty nineteen and is still burning at the time of writing. Residence, 0:10:41.320 --> 0:10:43.680 some of whose houses are only sixty meters from the site, 0:10:44.240 --> 0:10:46.679 speak of having to stay indoors and keep windows and 0:10:46.760 --> 0:10:50.040 doors closed on days the wind blows the smoke towards them. 0:10:51.200 --> 0:10:54.719 The problem of odour and other forms of contamination is 0:10:54.800 --> 0:10:57.680 further complicated by the fact that landfills were frequently situated 0:10:57.720 --> 0:11:01.959 an area of relatively low socioeconomics status. The area around 0:11:01.960 --> 0:11:05.920 the Sunshine landfill borders some of Melbourne's least advantage suburbs. 0:11:06.800 --> 0:11:09.280 In the case of Lucas Heights. The bushland that surrounds 0:11:09.280 --> 0:11:12.320 it diminishes its impact on residents, but that doesn't mean 0:11:12.360 --> 0:11:15.559 there aren't ever complaints. When we get a complaint, we 0:11:15.679 --> 0:11:18.760 always try to identify the source of the smell, says Chayang. 0:11:19.400 --> 0:11:21.719 So we ask questions about what the smell is. But 0:11:21.880 --> 0:11:25.280 sometimes they cannot really describe it. They just say, tip Booter, 0:11:26.480 --> 0:11:29.160 the smell is an indicator of something else, however, something 0:11:29.240 --> 0:11:32.800 far more significant. Not all the garbage being spread and 0:11:32.920 --> 0:11:36.199 compacted by the bulldozers is inert in organic matter such 0:11:36.240 --> 0:11:39.240 as concrete and metal. Instead, it contains large amounts of 0:11:39.320 --> 0:11:42.319 organic material. A lot of this is food waste, but 0:11:42.440 --> 0:11:45.160 certainly not all of it, as the building Pellett's been 0:11:45.160 --> 0:11:47.280 crushed by the compact to demonstrate, there is also a 0:11:47.320 --> 0:11:50.800 lot of wood, as well as cardboard, paper, and other 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:54.840 items such as nappies and adult and continence products. Even 0:11:54.880 --> 0:11:57.719 before it arrives here, this mess of organic material will 0:11:57.760 --> 0:12:02.280 have begun to decomposechrobes invade it, they begin to break 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:05.960 down the chemical bonds that hold it together, transforming organic 0:12:06.040 --> 0:12:10.280 compounds such as proteins, lipids, and carbohydrates into sugars and 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:14.640 amino acids and releasing carbon dioxide. But this is only 0:12:14.679 --> 0:12:17.480 the first stage in the process. As the supply of 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:19.719 oxygen is cut off, either by the weight of the 0:12:19.800 --> 0:12:22.520 garbage above or by the layer of earth on top 0:12:22.559 --> 0:12:27.800 of the mound, anaerobic bacteria takeover. These convert the increasingly 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:32.320 soupy mess into acids and alcohol. This process, which can 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:36.360 continue for decades, generates heat the interior of a landfall 0:12:36.400 --> 0:12:39.760 is typically between sixty to ninety degrees centigrade, as well 0:12:39.800 --> 0:12:42.160 as large amounts of liquid in the form of highly 0:12:42.280 --> 0:12:46.920 acidic leachate. This leachate, which must be channeled out for treatment, 0:12:47.600 --> 0:12:50.880 usually contains a small gus board of toxins, ranging from 0:12:50.920 --> 0:12:54.400 heavy metals to pesticides and dangerous industrial chemicals such as 0:12:54.480 --> 0:13:00.760 polychlorinated biphenyls or PCBs. Of particular concern a high concentrations 0:13:00.800 --> 0:13:04.680 of PERR and polyfluo alcohol substances more commonly known as 0:13:04.800 --> 0:13:09.199 pfazes or forever chemicals used in an astonishing variety of 0:13:09.320 --> 0:13:14.640 industrial and commercial applications, fire fighting foams, non stick surfaces 0:13:14.679 --> 0:13:20.280 on cooking products, electrical cables, paint glue, waterproof fabrics, carpet 0:13:20.679 --> 0:13:23.640 and even makeup and lipstick. Pfazes have been linked to 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:28.480 a long list of cancers, birth and developmental abnormalities, hormonal problems, 0:13:28.600 --> 0:13:33.480 and other disorders. They are also inconveniently for landfill operators, 0:13:33.960 --> 0:13:37.400 highly mobile and capable of traveling long distances if they 0:13:37.520 --> 0:13:41.680 enter groundwater. In twenty seventeen, a study of twenty seven 0:13:41.720 --> 0:13:44.640 Australian landfills found pfazes in the leech eight at all 0:13:44.720 --> 0:13:47.520 of them. And while most states now regulate the disposal 0:13:47.559 --> 0:13:53.559 of prefazes, leaks still occur, particularly as landfills age. No 0:13:53.679 --> 0:13:59.040 Less importantly, decomposing landfill produces a cocktail of gases. These 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:02.280 include trace elements of unpleasant substances such as dimethyl and 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:06.160 hydrogen sulfides, the compounds responsible for the unpleasant odor many 0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:10.360 of us associate with rotten garbage, ammonia and benzene, as 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:14.319 well as considerable quantities of carbon dioxide. But most importantly, 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:19.240 decomposing landfill releases large amounts of methane. Methane is the 0:14:19.320 --> 0:14:22.720 main constituent in natural gas, and as such is highly flammable. 0:14:23.640 --> 0:14:27.440 More significantly, however, it is an extremely potent greenhouse gas, 0:14:28.000 --> 0:14:30.480 trapping close to thirty times as much heat across a 0:14:30.520 --> 0:14:35.880 century as carbon dioxide. Its potency means curbing methane emissions 0:14:35.920 --> 0:14:38.000 is a crucial part of the fight against climate change. 0:14:38.840 --> 0:14:40.920 But after plateauing in the early years of the twenty 0:14:40.960 --> 0:14:44.560 first century, methane emissions began rising again in two thousand 0:14:44.600 --> 0:14:47.760 and six and have continued to accelerate, particularly in the 0:14:47.840 --> 0:14:51.360 years since twenty twenty. This spike and methane emissions is 0:14:51.400 --> 0:14:53.720 one of the biggest obstacles keeping global heating under one 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:57.080 point five degrees and cutting methane emissions by forty five 0:14:57.120 --> 0:14:59.920 percent by twenty thirty would avoid zero point three d 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.880 degrees of heating. About sixty percent of methane emissions are 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:07.120 caused by humans. Three quarters of this comes from agriculture, 0:15:07.440 --> 0:15:10.160 largely of what is known as enteric fermentation or cow 0:15:10.240 --> 0:15:13.680 verbs and fossil fuel extraction, but most of the rest 0:15:13.800 --> 0:15:17.720 is produced by landfills and waste management. Indeed, while landfill 0:15:17.760 --> 0:15:21.160 gas only makes up about twenty percent of anthropogenic methane emissions, 0:15:21.680 --> 0:15:25.120 the potency of the methane means that the decomposing landfill 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:28.840 accounts for just under two percent of greenhouse emissions, about 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:32.240 the same as aviation or global shipping. To put that 0:15:32.320 --> 0:15:36.400 in perspective, that's almost twice Australia's total emissions, not a 0:15:36.440 --> 0:15:39.600 lot less than those of Japan, the seventh largest emitter 0:15:39.680 --> 0:15:43.640 in the world. Here in Australia, landfills are estimated to 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:47.240 produce around three percent of our total emissions. Worse yet, 0:15:47.680 --> 0:15:51.840 that figure may be an underestimate. Until recently, calculations of 0:15:51.840 --> 0:15:54.600 the emissions from landfills were mostly based on modeling of 0:15:54.680 --> 0:15:57.680 data from a small number of facilities. But over the 0:15:57.720 --> 0:16:00.840 past few years a network of satellite its and aircrafts 0:16:00.880 --> 0:16:04.520 and carrying out more direct observations is revealed that many 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:08.720 landfills emit far more methane than previously understood. A study 0:16:08.840 --> 0:16:12.080 published earlier this year showed landfills in the United States 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:15.280 produced one point four times more methane than previously reported, 0:16:15.920 --> 0:16:19.560 while analysis of satellite data by The Guardian identified several 0:16:19.680 --> 0:16:22.240 hundred huge leaks of methane at landfills around the world 0:16:22.280 --> 0:16:25.240 in twenty twenty two. The vast bulk of these super 0:16:25.280 --> 0:16:28.600 emitter events were centered on large, poorly managed landfills and 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:32.920 developing countries such as India, Pakistan and Bangladesh that are 0:16:32.960 --> 0:16:37.720 also detected in Europe, The United States and in one instance, Australia. 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:41.480 Landfill operators have traditionally dealt with this problem by the 0:16:41.560 --> 0:16:44.840 flaring the gas, essentially burning it off as it leaks out, 0:16:45.320 --> 0:16:47.920 or by extracting the gas and using it to generate electricity. 0:16:48.760 --> 0:16:51.200 This converts to the methane into carbon dioxide, which, while 0:16:51.520 --> 0:16:54.800 still a greenhouse gas, traps far less heat, at least 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:58.200 in the short term. Lucas Heights, like most large landfills 0:16:58.240 --> 0:17:01.160 in Australia, takes the second approach, sinking dozens of gas 0:17:01.240 --> 0:17:03.200 wells into the mound and piping the gas to a 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:05.879 small power plant in one corner of the site, a 0:17:06.000 --> 0:17:09.240 process that produces enough electricity to power twenty five thousand homes. 0:17:10.680 --> 0:17:13.080 Clean Away estimates its gas wells at Lucas Heights capture 0:17:13.080 --> 0:17:16.119 about ninety percent of the methane the facility produces, but 0:17:16.280 --> 0:17:20.280 other facilities are less scrupulous. Australian government figures estimate that 0:17:20.440 --> 0:17:23.080 less than half the gas produced by landfills gets caught, 0:17:23.400 --> 0:17:25.719 and only about four fifths of that, or a bit 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:28.680 under forty percent of the total, is converted into energy. 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:32.000 Or to put that another way, more than sixty percent 0:17:32.080 --> 0:17:34.800 of the methane released by Australian landfills leaks away into 0:17:34.840 --> 0:17:36.120 the atmosphere. 0:17:39.160 --> 0:17:42.080 Coming up after the break. Can Australia rise to the 0:17:42.160 --> 0:17:44.080 challenge of our waste management problem? 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:02.840 Methane emissions produced by landfill or only one part of 0:18:02.920 --> 0:18:05.639 a far larger problem with the way Australia handles its waste. 0:18:06.720 --> 0:18:09.159 The transition to a low carbon world depends upon a 0:18:09.200 --> 0:18:12.680 move to a more sustainable and therefore more circular economy. 0:18:13.440 --> 0:18:15.440 Rather than bundling up our crap and tipping it into 0:18:15.440 --> 0:18:18.600 a hole, we should be reusing and recycling far more 0:18:18.600 --> 0:18:22.000 than we do at present. Many of the technologies needed 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:26.840 to enable this shift already exist. Cardboard, metal, plastic, and 0:18:26.960 --> 0:18:31.160 many other materials can be recovered and recycled. Methane emissions 0:18:31.200 --> 0:18:34.040 from landfill could be rapidly reduced by requiring all landfill 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:38.040 operators to install gas capture technology, or, better yet, by 0:18:38.080 --> 0:18:40.880 simply banning the flow of organics to a landfill altogether. 0:18:42.080 --> 0:18:45.160 Once diverted from landfill, food waste could be transformed into 0:18:45.240 --> 0:18:49.040 compost or combined with other organic waste in anaerobic digesters. 0:18:49.920 --> 0:18:53.600 These devices, which employ the same processes of decomposition that 0:18:53.680 --> 0:18:57.560 take place in landfills. Under controlled conditions allow one hundred 0:18:57.560 --> 0:18:59.840 percent of the gas produced to be captured and transformed 0:18:59.840 --> 0:19:03.639 in to energy, and the remaining material, known as digestate, 0:19:04.119 --> 0:19:07.680 to be used as compost. Material that is unsuitable for 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:11.520 ether composting or an aerobic digestion can be incinerated or 0:19:11.600 --> 0:19:16.200 transformed in waste to energy facilities. A recognition of the 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:19.120 importance of increasing circularity was embedded in the National Waste 0:19:19.160 --> 0:19:22.720 Policy under the Morrison government in twenty nineteen, which saw 0:19:22.840 --> 0:19:25.760 all three levels of government agree to work together to 0:19:25.880 --> 0:19:30.480 reduce waste and increase recycling. Central to the strategy was 0:19:30.520 --> 0:19:33.520 an ambitious action plan that committed to recovering or recycling 0:19:33.640 --> 0:19:37.080 eighty percent of Australia's waste, harving the amount of organic 0:19:37.160 --> 0:19:40.200 waste ends up in landfill, and reducing per capita waste 0:19:40.280 --> 0:19:44.520 by ten percent by twenty thirty. Five years later, those 0:19:44.560 --> 0:19:48.280 targets look hopelessly optimistic. Not only has the overall resource 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:51.440 recovery rate barely shifted, but both the amount of organics 0:19:51.440 --> 0:19:53.920 we sent to landfill and per capita waste production have 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:58.480 actually increased. Mike Ritchie is the managing director of MRA 0:19:58.720 --> 0:20:04.359 Consulting Group of Australia's leading environmental consultancies. A former Director 0:20:04.400 --> 0:20:08.320 of Waste Management and Resource Recovery Association Australia w M 0:20:08.520 --> 0:20:11.919 double r Here's worked for VISI, served as a sessional 0:20:11.920 --> 0:20:14.359 commission for the New South Wales Land and Environment Court, 0:20:14.760 --> 0:20:17.280 and spent six years as national general manager at waste 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:21.760 giant Suez Australia. Richie says there is little to no 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:25.360 chance Australia will meet the targets under existing policy settings. 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:28.639 We're currently twelve million tons a year behind where we 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:30.840 need to be to meet and eighty percent recovery rate. 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:36.360 Richie says by twenty thirty, population growth and rising consumption 0:20:36.920 --> 0:20:39.440 mean that gap will be closer to eighteen million tons. 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:43.120 To close that gap, we need to grow our recycling 0:20:43.200 --> 0:20:46.720 rate by about two to three million tons a year. Historically, 0:20:47.160 --> 0:20:50.280 Australia has never done anything like that. The best we've 0:20:50.320 --> 0:20:53.080 achieved is about a million tons a year, so we 0:20:53.160 --> 0:20:56.040 need to double or triple the rate we're growing recycling. 0:20:57.240 --> 0:21:00.000 Richie argues that the fundamental problem is a lack of accountability. 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:04.639 We've seen almost zero coordination between the states, territories and 0:21:04.760 --> 0:21:07.640 local government on how to actually achieve the targets, he says, 0:21:08.400 --> 0:21:10.680 and there's not a single person in Australia at a state, 0:21:10.960 --> 0:21:13.119 federal or local level whose job it is to make 0:21:13.160 --> 0:21:16.760 sure we hit them. Gail Sloane is the chief executive 0:21:16.960 --> 0:21:20.320 w M double R. When I ask her whether Australia 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:22.679 is on track to meet the waste targets, she laughs, 0:21:23.280 --> 0:21:26.800 We're not even close, she says. Our recycling rate is 0:21:26.880 --> 0:21:30.160 stagnated at sixty two or sixty three percent since twenty nineteen. 0:21:30.800 --> 0:21:32.560 That means we have six years to grow it by 0:21:32.600 --> 0:21:35.639 seventeen percent. That just isn't going to happen on our 0:21:35.720 --> 0:21:40.159 current trajectory of investment in market development. When asked for comment, 0:21:40.640 --> 0:21:43.520 the Federal Minister for the Environment in Water Tanya plipersec 0:21:44.000 --> 0:21:48.640 emphasize the government's investment in recycling infrastructure with states, territories 0:21:48.640 --> 0:21:51.480 in industry. We're spending one billion dollars on one hundred 0:21:51.480 --> 0:21:54.359 and thirty two projects which will recycle an extra one 0:21:54.440 --> 0:21:57.440 point three million tons of waste while creating over three 0:21:57.520 --> 0:22:01.600 thousand jobs. Plybersex said in an email statement. Once this 0:22:01.720 --> 0:22:04.440 funding has been rolled out, we will almost double recycling 0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:07.879 capacity in Australia. We've also funded twenty nine projects to 0:22:07.920 --> 0:22:11.360 recycle food and organic waste, which will increase organic processing 0:22:11.400 --> 0:22:15.639 by almost one million tons each year. Sloan dismisses this claim. 0:22:16.600 --> 0:22:18.920 The investment that the government refers to as the Recycling 0:22:18.960 --> 0:22:22.359 Modernization Fund commenced under the Morrison government to address the 0:22:22.400 --> 0:22:25.880 approximately two million tons of predominantly plastic and paper material 0:22:25.920 --> 0:22:28.480 that were kept in Australia when their export was banned 0:22:28.520 --> 0:22:31.879 in twenty nineteen. It was never intended to address over 0:22:31.960 --> 0:22:35.040 twenty million tons of valuable material going to landfill every year, 0:22:35.560 --> 0:22:37.639 of which we need to divert least another ten million 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:39.800 tons in the next six years to achieve our twenty 0:22:39.840 --> 0:22:43.359 thirty targets. Part of the problem is a lack of 0:22:43.440 --> 0:22:46.960 policies designed to divert waste and in particular, greenhouse gas 0:22:47.080 --> 0:22:51.600 generating organics from landfill. In the media, recycling and diversion 0:22:51.640 --> 0:22:53.879 from landfill is often framed as a question of corporate 0:22:53.960 --> 0:22:58.560 social responsibility. But Richie and every person I have spoken 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:02.240 to in the industry that this is a mistake. The 0:23:02.320 --> 0:23:05.960 industry is economically rational. They won't drive four hundred kilometers 0:23:06.000 --> 0:23:08.280 to pick up a ton of cardboard, nor will they 0:23:08.359 --> 0:23:10.440 drive an eight ton truck around the suburbs of Sydney 0:23:10.480 --> 0:23:13.520 to pick up food waste. He says, while he allows 0:23:13.560 --> 0:23:16.520 it at some companies committing to such practices for brand 0:23:16.560 --> 0:23:20.520 recognition reasons, that won't lead most to follow suit. The 0:23:20.640 --> 0:23:24.040 economics are dragging them the other way. In a competitive world, 0:23:24.520 --> 0:23:26.359 if I own a restaurant and it's cheaper for me 0:23:26.480 --> 0:23:29.160 to land fill my food waste, then that's where it's going. 0:23:30.000 --> 0:23:32.879 Waste is like a river, It flows downhill to the 0:23:32.960 --> 0:23:39.439 cheapest price, and in Australia that's almost always landfill. In Europe, 0:23:39.840 --> 0:23:42.119 governments have simply banned the flow of many materials to 0:23:42.200 --> 0:23:45.119 landfill altogether, resulting in rates of land filling they are 0:23:45.119 --> 0:23:47.320 as much as ninety to ninety five percent lower than 0:23:47.320 --> 0:23:50.080 in Australia, which he prefers the use of levies which 0:23:50.080 --> 0:23:53.560 they allow more flexibility. But he argues that either way, 0:23:54.240 --> 0:23:57.560 governments haven't done that work. They haven't approached it and said, 0:23:57.960 --> 0:24:00.359 all right, we've made a commitment to a target of 0:24:00.400 --> 0:24:03.520