Landfill

First day back to the internship and the countdown is on until my rotations begin (5 more days!). Today we went to the Rumpke landfill. You may be wondering why? and well...I still can't answer that question for you. Once I find out I'll be sure to fill you in. Even though I was not looking forward to going on this tour I was pleasantly surprised on how interesting it was. Here are some things I learned:


Rumpke began in 1932 but as a hog farm, feeding the edible trash to the hogs. This was soon banned and the Rumpke family made the choice to pursue a waste and recycling business in the 1940s. If I remember correctly our tour guide said they are allowed to take 300,000 tons or 600,000,000 pounds of trash a day. 


As we rode up the landfill there was a giant hole called a 'cell' that has been in the process of being dug since before 2005. One of the pictures shows this cell. The cells go through a specific process and once dug, clayed and correctly layered to protect the earth, trash can then begin to fill it. The parts of the landfill that are drivable were perviously cells and have been filled. The cell that we were driving on had only been filled for 2 years and had already been filled 360 feet. It still had 13 years left before completely full. Going further up the landfill we learned out the specific drainage process they have, the way they pull out gasses that are being released from decomposition and when we finally reached the top it was a gorgeous view of the cincinnati area with the American flag flying high. A beautiful view from the top of a landfill, who knew? 

I never imagined a landfill had to go through so much engineering just to be able to hold all the trash we throw away every day. Makes me think twice about how much waste everyone throws away each day and how important recycling really is. More on the importance of recycling after we tour the recycling center on Friday.