Bronze – V.I. Waste Management Authority and Sanitas Partners

St. Croix Transfer Station
Preserving Paradise
Executive Summary
Known as “America’s Paradise,” the United States Virgin Islands, a territory of the
U.S., encompasses three main islands (St. Croix, St. John and St. Thomas) located
southeast of Puerto Rico. The largest of the three by far is St. Croix, with a land
mass of nearly 80 square miles and a population approaching 60,000.
It is home to the Henry E. Rohlsen Airport, where thousands of residents and tourist
pass through each year. It is also home to the Anguilla Landfill, a parcel of land
leased from the Virgin Islands Port Authority. The landfill sits less than 2,000 feet
from the runways, well within the Federal Aviation Administration requirement of
10,000 feet for facilities likely to attract wildlife that create potential hazards for
flight safety.
Demands by the FAA to the Port Authority to address the wildlife issue went
unaddressed by the territory for decades, eventually leading the FAA to withhold
discretionary funds, crippling capital improvements at the airport.
The Virgin Islands Waste Management Authority was created by the territorial
government in 2004 and began complete operations in 2005. The first order of
business was to find a way to combat the bird issue on St. Croix. By working with
local residents, local haulers, the Department of Planning and Natural Resources
and others, the VIWMA created the first permitted solid waste facility in the
V.I., meeting not only their initial goal, but opening doors to before unimagined
opportunities for creating a complete integrated solid waste management system.
Facility Design
While much of the design for the transfer station
is taken from proven methods for managing
300 tons per day of solid waste, the innovative
features inside the 22,000-plus square
foot station make it much more flexible and
adaptable than any other transfer facility in the
United States.
Before the facility was constructed, as many
as 200 vehicles a day drove a winding, steep
and heavily rutted road to dump materials at the
landfill face. Now, that number has been reduced
by over 80% on average, with most of that traffic
being trailers from the station itself.
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Above and below: St.
Croix Transfer Station
during construction.
The building is designed with a standard hardened concrete tipping floor and
reinforced pushwalls, and uses translucent roof panels for natural light, supplemented
by environmentally friendly, energy efficient over head fixtures. The air quality
management controls include four extra large ventilation fans in addition to a misting
system to control potential dust and odor issues. It is completely covered by an
automatic fire suppression system with a dedicated 24,000 gallon reservoir on site.
Due to the climate and potential hazardous weather common in the Caribbean, the
building is designed to withstand hurricane force winds. As an added protection,
the facility is sited near the base of the inland side of the landfill, offering additional
protection for St. Croix’s top asset following any natural disaster.
The real innovation for the St. Croix Transfer Station is housed behind the pushwalls
and under the clear span roof. After arriving from the scale house, waste is deposited
onto a reinforced tipping floor. From the tipping floor, the waste is screened and loaded
into a hopper that leads to an up-feed conveyor. From there, the material is dropped
into a F.A.E.S. baler, producing bales weighing between 1.5-2.0 tons. From the baler,
the new bales travel by way of computer operated conveyor to a Cross Wrap CW2200
wrapper, where it is double wrapped. The first wrap is completed vertically to prevent
waste from falling, then horizontally to complete an air-tight package. Once complete,
the bale moves down a conveyor to be placed on a trailer for transport.
Waste is loaded from the floor to the baler hopper.
Waste is moved up the conveyor to the baler.
From the baler, the waste is moved to the wrapper.
It is then moved from the wrapper to the trailer
for delivery to the landfill face.
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At the moment, there are few known facilities in the United States that not only bale,
but also wrap municipal solid waste, and each has its own reason. In St. Croix, the
baling was designed to stop winged wildlife from saturating an area so close to the
Rohlsen runways. Within three weeks of opening, the plan had succeeded.
Three weeks after opening, the St. Croix Transfer Station had helped the
Anguilla Landfill virtually remove all issues of winged wildlife. It was stage one
of integrating the transfer station into the complete operations of the VIWMA.
Environmental Controls & Regulatory Compliance
The transfer station is the lynchpin of a burgeoning integrated solid waste
management program never before considered by the residents of the U.S.
Virgin Islands. Not only has the St. Croix Transfer Station solved the FAA issues,
it has opened the door for the VIWMA to aggressively address difficult lingering
issues including the closing of the Anguilla Landfill, separating hard to handle
and prohibited wastes, the beginning of a recycling program, the development of
a composting facility and the ability to respond quickly and decisively to natural
disasters.
The Virgin Islands Port Authority, the owner of the property upon which the Anguilla
Landfill sits, has been pushing for the closing the facility for a number of years. But
two problems persisted: 1) how to complete the landfill with the materials available
and 2) what to do with the MSW generated by St. Croix upon closure of the facility.
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To meet the need to stabilize
the landfill, bales from the
transfer station are used
to not only complete the
airspace, but also to create
the appropriate slopes for the
long term closure of Anguilla.
Bales placed and partially covered to create
the appropriate slopes for the eventual closure of the Anguilla landfill.
The process requires the cooperation
of both the trailer driver and the landfill
operator to gently remove the bales
from the trailer and place them in a predetermined position. Unlike a balefill,
where the object is to simply bury the
waste, the placement at Anguilla is
even more critical to maximize both the
airspace and create opportunities for
another portion of the St. Croix waste
stream.
Great cooperation is required to place the bales
in appropriate locations.
With the building of the St. Croix Transfer
Station, authorities recognized an
opportunity for exploring the diversion
of waste through composting and
mulching. The VIWMA purchased a 1,000
horsepower Diamond Z Cutter horizontal
grinder, one of the most powerful grinders
in the world. Three times a week the
grinder is used to reduce the volume of
the large amount of green waste that
grows in the tropical paradise. All material
reduction is completed inside the station
to minimize dust.
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All grinding is completed indoors to take
advantage of the misting system and to
prevent dust and other nuisances from
escaping.
Much of the shredded green waste is being used as alternative daily cover (ADC)
for Anguilla prior to a final cap. It is critical to the success of the landfill project to
use ADC as much as possible to mitigate the need for the expensive importation of
soil for eventual closure.
Shredded green waste is being used for alternative daily cover (ADC) that
both returns the plants to the ground and helps with keeping down the cost
of closure at Anguilla.
Additionally, the challenge of maintaining compliance with the United States
Environmental Protection Agency in regards to unacceptable waste getting into
Anguilla had been, in some cases, a losing battle. Residential solid waste is
collected by a small group of local haulers and the VIWMA itself on a door-to-door
basis, but much of the volume at the landfill arrives via open top roll off containers
from four drop-off locations strategically placed around the island. Because these
four sites have no secure perimeter and are unmanned, items such as tires, lead
acid batteries, white goods still containing CFC’s and C&D waste periodically found
a home in the landfill despite the VIWMA’s best efforts to properly manage the
waste.
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With the construction of the transfer station, waste is now screened twice before
entering the processing system. First, at the modern, computer driven scale house,
not only can the scale operator now get an accurate accounting of the weight of
items in each category, but cameras allow a first look at the vehicles delivering the
waste.
Left: With modern computerized scale
technology, the scale operator both creates an
accurate record of waste received by weight
and type and has an opportunity, using four fixed
mount cameras, to do initial waste screening.
The second opportunity for waste screening comes from the transfer station
floor itself, as hard to manage wastes such as tires, are pulled from the inflow
and segregated for appropriate handling. This process includes separating
wood waste, construction and demolition debris and green waste from
commingled loads for size reduction and use as ADC, mulch or other disposal
as appropriate.
Wood waste, construction and demolition debris, green wastes and other hard to manage wastes are
separated on the tipping floor for proper handling.
Since its formation, the VIWMA has been aggressively pursuing a way to
begin recycling in America’s Paradise that would be both economically and
operationally efficient. Using the best information available, the Authority has
looked at several options, but has been stymied by lack of infrastructure and
an economical means to package and transport recyclables off the islands to
market.
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The St. Croix Transfer Station was designed not only with proper handling of
municipal solid waste in mind, but as a strong first step towards a complete
recycling program. Not only is green waste separated for diversion, other
recyclables such as metals and white goods are separated, and future plans call
for a possible expansion of the facility to include a front-loaded material recovery
facility.
An hour’s worth of metal with some e-waste included from a
typical mid-week day.
The St. Croix Transfer Station has also allowed VIWMA to move forward with
the replacing the environmentally suspect drop off sites with modern, manned
convenience centers.
The first such center opened in April,
2013 with the completion of the Peter’s
Rest Convenience Center. Operated
through a contract with local partner
Bates Trucking, the center staff now
is able to direct users to designated
compactors that enclose the waste,
keeping out both vectors and storm water
and preventing scavenging. The type
of waste accepted is clearly marked.
Those segregated items are transported
to SCTS where it is processed, recycled
or diverted, depending on proper
management methods.
Signage at Peter’s Rest Convenience Center is both
clearly worded and user friendly to more than one
language.
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Left: Strong customer
service is demanded by
the VIWMA and provided
by the organization’s
employees and
contractors.
The convenience center includes a household hazardous waste (HHW) dropoff point, with those items being delivered for proper management directly to the
VIWMA.
A centralized Household Hazardous Waste drop-off is included at
Peter’s Rest, helping to keep HHW out of the transfer station.
Program Planning
Planning for the new St. Croix Transfer Station was done with an eye towards
potential future use as a site for the creation of refuse derived fuel (RDF) for a
waste-to-energy project. When that project was placed on hold, VIWMA authorities
began to adjust the plan, realizing the potential for creating a fully integrated waste
management system on St. Croix.
The planners called for a site as centrally located site as possible, a need met by
building on the same property as the Anguilla Landfill. This placement also followed
Solid Waste Association of North America training recommendations to co-locate
MSW sites whenever possible.
The station was designed to process up to 500 tons per day under emergency
circumstances, with a daily throughput of 275-325 tons per day under normal
circumstances. The system, including the baler and the wrapper, was designed to
produce up to 20 bales per hour or approximately 30-40 tons per hour. The planning
process also included using the station as the central facility in an integrated solid
waste management program, based on the expected throughput.
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A heavy preventative maintenance plan was put in place during the planning and
building process. Several hundreds of thousands of dollars in replacement parts
were acquired and stored on property to affect repairs quickly in the event of an
unscheduled service interruption. On the rare occasion when there is a mechanical
failure within the station, the tipping floor has room to store three or more days of
peak delivery; if the interruption is caused by an issue at the landfill, the station
has room to store up to a day-and-a-half of bale production under cover and near
unlimited storage outdoors with storm water measures already in place.
The anticipated through put, however, was drastically affected by the unexpected
closure of the Hosvena Refinery. Hosvena, the second largest oil refinery in
the Western Hemisphere and a partnership between the Hess Corporation of
Pennsylvania and the Government of Venezuela, announced in March of 2012 the
refinery would be shuttered, just days into operational testing of the SCTS.
The closure of the refinery meant a loss of 2,500 direct jobs and nearly
$100,000,000 in direct tax revenue for the USVI government. With contractors and
suppliers no longer supporting the refinery estimated to number in the same range
of 2,500, the economy of St. Croix lost nearly $150,000,000, according to one
study.
Undeterred, VIWMA and its partners continued with the completion, focusing on
the environmental benefits of closing Anguilla, meeting the demands of the Port
Authority and the FAA and planning for its long term integrated program.
Performance, Economics and Cost Effectiveness
Since beginning complete operations, the St. Croix Transfer Station has exceeded
original expectations for performance and cost effectiveness.
The key to the efficiency has been the relative simplicity to a somewhat complex
operation and strong pre-placement and continuing staff training. Through those
commitments, the station has consistently processed an average of approximately
150 tons of MSW a day during the week and half that on weekend days. Included in
that total is an average of 45 tons per day of green waste that is processed three
days a week to supply both the ADC needs of Anguilla and, to a lesser extent, a test
project in preparation for composting.
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It is nearly impossible to compare the St. Croix Transfer Station to any other facility
in the world on any matrix. The uniqueness of the populous served, being locked on
an island and starting a fully integrated system from scratch with the only funding
being appropriations from the Territorial Government’s General Fund, the VIWMA is
plowing fresh ground in the Caribbean. As the first permitted facility in the U.S. Virgin
Islands, the St. Croix Transfer Station is setting standards rather than just trying to
meet them.
One measure of success is that the station continues to meet projections for
benchmark through puts in relation to time and expenses, due to the experience
and commitment of the local contractor, Sanitas Partners, V.I., LLC. As such, the
station itself is well within budgeted costs.
Another measure of success has been the increased positive customer response
to the facility. For haulers, the station removes the need for a long and equipment
rattling trip to the working face of the landfill; instead they are able to enter the
property, tip on a concrete floor and exit. The Peter’s Rest Convenience Center has
been so well received that VIWMA is hoping to speed the process to replace the
remaining three drop-off sites with fully functional convenience centers.
A final sector that is has been very
pleased by the service received at SCTS
has been the United States Immigration
and Customs Enforcement, a division of
the Department of Homeland Security.
When ICE finds contraband that has
entered the island, instead of waiting
for coverage of an open landfill face,
officers are able to place the material
on the floor of the transfer station and
document not only the destruction of
the illegal items by track hoe and/front
loader, they can also quickly verify that
the leftover is properly disposed by
documenting the bales the residue is
wrapped in, all in a matter of minutes.
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Contraband cigarettes from China are
destroyed at the SCTS while officers of
Immigration and Customs Enforcement
look on and document.
Use of Equipment/Systems and Technologies
The St. Croix Transfer Station uses contemporary equipment for operations,
including a track hoe, front loader and skid steer with multiple attachments for
loading waste and cleaning/maintenance purposes. For processing, a bale and
wrap system, as discussed before, is used, moving bales on conveyor belts to a
material handling lift truck for loading onto trailers for transport.
Worker and Customer Safety & Health
Safety and training continues to be a point of partnership and strong agreement
between VIWMA and Sanitas Partners, VI. A complete safety program manual is
in use on the site and updated regularly. But more than just words on paper, the
commitment extends to action.
Each Monday morning before operations begin the entire staff of the SCTS meets
for safety and operational meetings. The documented gathering touches on any
situations that may have arisen during the prior week and completes a scheduled
program on a specific item. In addition, operational activities are addressed with
the input of staff solicited for potential improvements.
The VIWMA’s commitment to training is
highlighted in the operating contract with
a requirement that the operator to have
certification by the Solid Waste Association of
North American, the industry leader in training
and education. Going above and beyond
the requirements, Sanitas Partners, V.I. has
held private training sessions for selected
employees seeking that certification. In 2012,
four staff members were certified, with four
expected to be certified in 2013 (exam results
pending). In addition, three employees have
completed training for SWANA’s Managing
Recycling Programs certification and are
awaiting their test results. This is in addition
to VIWMA employees who hold multiple
certifications.
This demand for exceptional training has paid off for both parties. No injuries or
illnesses were recorded on the SCTS OSHA 300 log for 2012 nor have any been
recorded in the first five months of 2013.
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Public Acceptance, Apperance & Aesthetics
The St. Croix Transfer Station facility is like any other facility that accepts MSW for
processing: at any given moment, it can be a mess inside and sometimes out. But
responding to those moments is what makes a facility team outstanding.
Two employees are dedicated to keeping the baling and wrapping area clean and
functioning, while all employees are expected to assist with the cleaning process
inside and out at the end of each day.
Equipment operators are responsible not only for daily maintenance checks
(pre-operation/post-operation) but for daily cleaning of the equipment.
Public education has been accomplished through on-site visits from schools and
printed material shared with the public, mainly at large festivals and public events.
(See Exhibit 1).
The facility has become a great neighbor for its most important adjacent parcel,
the Henry E. Rohlsen International Airport, as evidenced by a very positive response
from the FAA. (See Exhibit 2). The partnership with Anguilla Landfill continues to be
a win- win for both properties and VIWMA.
St. Croix Transfer Station: Congresswomen Donna
Christensen, Tim Hodge of Sanitas Partners, VI, LLC,
Assistant Secretary of Insular Areas for the US Department
of Interior Tony Babauta, May Adams Cornwall, VIWMA’S
Executive Director.
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In some ways, the St. Croix Transfer Station is similar to many across the United States. But
there are so many more ways that it has been created differently, with not just transfer of
waste in mind, but with bold and future looking planning. Planning that foresees the station
as both the beginning and the central focus point in the future of a complete integrated solid
waste management program, adaptable to changing requirements that are unique to an
island setting.
With the conscientious operation of the contractor, partnership oversight by the VIWMA and
the dedication of the citizens and customers, the St. Croix Transfer Station may well be the
best neighbor America’s Paradise could ever ask for.
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Exhibit 1
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Exhibit 2
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