Which do you think is better/worse to do? Discussing this with my neighbor, we both prefer to burn personal papers but he said he takes a truck load a month to the ever growing mountain of a landfill that's about 5miles away. They truck and rail garbage in from other states and people wonder why the cancer rates in the area are so high.
What to do what to do?

I bought a paper shredder to dispose of things I don't want people poking through. I burn it after I shred it.

As far as landfills go, people here can't be bothered with the expense or hassle of taking their unwanted items there. Someone dropped this off on the side of a local road. Common practice here. Lowlifes!

I hear that posco, tires and furniture line a lot of back roads here.

I'm not a eco freak but stuff like that is a crime against humanity.

Paper and cardboard we burn

Living in the bush we used a burning barrel,and clean out the burnt cans and glass once in a while and bury it.Burnt cans rust away quickly and the glass was busted up.Plastic was collected and carried out.
Burning plastic is not good.Years ago there was not much plastic.Today plastic is pervasive.Plastic will kill the planet unless people stop using it,which is unlikely.Most stuff made out of plastic today was once made out of metal,glass or wood/fibre.

Hey Boco

Have you seen any incinerators going up in your area?

Serious question boco

I'm about to buy some off a guy in Kentucky that has apparently shipped 37 new style units up there somewhere.

OP

Don't waste your time burning. You won't hurt that landfill nor add to your cancer rate. If cancer rate is linked to landfill at all. It's the type of waste they are hauling in and how they have constructed landfill.

Life of land fill: collect waste, suck methane off waste, generate electricity, fill land fill, exhaust methane, pull waste back out, sort commodities out, burn rest, create more elec,

Burn all I can paper wise the bottles/cans/plastics go to the landfill a few times a year, aluminum cans a the steel items go to the scrap yard.

Every town here has its own landfill,and they recycle everthing they can, and basically dump the organics and cover.
Most guys that have camps in the bush still use the old burn barrel.

About 5 years ago the CEO of Waste Managememt said that in a decade they would be in the commodity business. Turns out he was wrong. Prices tanked and costs rose. They do harvest methane. In Denver they run their vehicles on methane and generate enough electricity to power their operations and sell back to the grid.

Any manufacturer who can use scrap plastic should see their cost of materials drop since China is out of the market. Glass is cheap also, but freight is high.

Tough business to navigate in.

The roadside dumping will always be a problem. A community has to have a place where people can bring that stuff and get rid of it for free, otherwise it won't happen. Even at that, some folks don't have a pickup to haul with. You have to go pick it up for them for free, and actually drive the alleys looking for junk furniture, appliances, etc, and ask them if you can haul it away for them for free, in order to keep your community clean.
I just cleaned up a property that my Son bought. The house was full of wet Depends diapers, as well as a trash can out in the back yard full of them. Too much effort to take it to the alley and put in in a dumpster. There were 4 fly strips hanging in the living room of this house, all full of dead flies. The house will always smell like urine, no matter what is done to it.

I burn cardboard, like cereal boxes etc, we have recycling bins for corrugated card board, newspapers, plastic bottles in our small town. I’m taking a load of junk this morning to the landfill.

My garbage/recycling fee was $150 last year, the recyclables all in one bin, picked up every other week. I here the hauler is going to raise rates next year because of the poor market for the recyclables, some paper is now being burned and some buried, cheaper than sorting it.

I try to have as little waste as possible. I burn most of the rest which isn't much.


As much as I dislike Walmart, they were very aggressive in getting products to do away with useless packaging that just wasted shelf space.


About road side dumping.....if you don't have a pickup truck to take garbage to the dump then you don't have one to take it to heto road either...... some people are just slobs no matter what.

Getting rid of house hold items...mattresses 15.00....TV..AC units....propane tanks ,fridge, washers dryers , cost money. Old wood / Sheetrock / demolition stuff is .05 per pound.....around here. No land fills anymore....they went out in the 80’s.

i had a guy dump a whole pickup load at my camp gate. He wasn't to bright. all sorts of stuff with his name on.
The sheriff had a field day with him.

Had some kids dump their senior skip day party trash and beer cans on mine, should have taken the school papers out, cops handled it, I sold the cans for picking up after them.

I'm living in a fairly populated part of CT, known as the Lower Naugatuck Valley, where sadly we give new meaning to polluted waterways.
There is an extensive recycling program, but God knows where that stuff winds up...
As far as garbage, once a week the trucks come and haul it away.
All the landfills - surprise - are on bodies of water, and folks wonder why our cancer rates are so sky high.
My own opinion, I think if one is able to live in a fairly un-populated area, burning is then ok because it will dissipate properly.
But if one's in a small city, or suburban town, unfortunately landfill might be the only option.
I sincerely hope I do not get in trouble for adding all these pictures, but pollution is something I take very seriously - because I see the direct results it has on marine life, waterfowl, wildlife, and yes people - especially children, who get very sick from playing in the water - which is something every child should be allowed to do.
I'm also just realizing that today is Earth Day, and for about 6 solid years I'd take out my canoe that's set up like a row boat and haul incredible amounts of trash - you name it - out of the two rivers [Housatonic and Naugatuck] right by where I live.
There's no question to me than much of the plastic came from the plants one town up, I think they do both recycling and trash to energy [burning] but it always amazed me the amount of trash that still made it to the river.
The homes along the Naugatuck River in my town [East Derby..] simply dump everything down their embankments down towards the river.
I wish I was makign that up but I am not.
When I shut down all three of my facebook pages, 4000 [not a typo] pictures like these - and many showing very sick/deceased wildlife - vanished as well , but i had no choice - my pictures were being stolen by anti's and AR people seeking to push their own agenda.
So, again - to me burning is ok if in very rural remote area, otherwise unfortunately landfill.
I do my best to recycle - and avoid plastic products, but that's easier said than done.
Also, all this river clean up - which I completely stopped doing about 3 years ago, as it was making me sick with rage - but when I saw how the wildlife was suffering, that became the impulse for me to getting my trappers license, as I came into this on the conservation and management angle.
That one picture at the bottom [depending on how all these images load] that's an Old Town Predator K-140 duck hunting kayak.
It's no longer made, but it's essentially a Twin Otter set up for duck hunting.
I see people asking about the best kayak - well, that's the best kayak in my opinion for water trapping as it carry's a lot of weight, is wide, 14 feet long, and very durable - easy to get in and out of....
I hope this comment isn't too long - but I'm not on Tman as much as I'd like to be right now, too much going on at once... but this topic [burn/landfill...] struck a chord with me.
Gotta say, some very good points being made here supporting both sides, which is always a good thing.