EDITORIAL
Everyone must play part in reducing trash

Tired of talking trash? So are we. But the fact is, together we O'ahu residents are producing 3,000 tons of garbage a day, and if we keep it up, the Waimanalo Gulch landfill might one day become the highest peak on the island.

So it's time for us all to think seriously about how to reduce our personal garbage. It's also time for the city administration and the City Council to quit their H-Power vs. plasma arc contest and work on a multipronged offensive. Such a plan could include expanded recycling, opening another landfill and improving the city H-POWER plant's capability while developing plasma arc technology.

First of all, we can all do a better job of reusing bottles and plastic bags. And rather than trashing newspapers, glass and plastic, take them to your local recycling center. Make it a conscious goal to halve your waste before the year's end.

As for landfills, nobody wants one in his back yard, it's bad for property values, etc. Ask the Leeward residents downwind from Waimanalo Gulch. But we're going to have to build another one to handle the municipal trash and the H-POWER ash while the city quibbles over which alternative technology to back.

We realize it's political suicide for a politician to allow a landfill in his district. But why couldn't the lame ducks on the City Council come up with a plan? Preferably the location will be dry and the landfill adequately lined to stop bacteria from leaching into the soil and groundwater.

Lastly, let's commit to an alternative waste-disposal technology to relieve the pressure on the landfills. As it stands, the city's H-POWER plant converts more than 2,000 tons of waste a day into energy. It says it would do better if it had $60 million to add a third boiler. It's a costly investment, but it's better than reinventing the wheel.

Plasma arc, which can turn trash into such materials as "glassphalt" for road resurfacing and other uses, is another option. Its backers on the City Council ask why we should spend big bucks on H-POWER when companies are offering to do plasma arc for free. Apparently, though, city officials recently toured a plasma arc plant in Japan, and noted that it cost $65 million and burnt just 160 tons of waste a day. That might not bode well for O'ahu's trash load of 3,000 tons a day.

The city powers have some big decisions to make, and we all have to pitch in to lower O'ahu's mountain of trash.