Metro Vancouver hunting for new dump

Metro Vancouver is searching for a new dump to take up to 200,000 tonnes of garbage annually once its contract with the Cache Creek landfill expires at the end of the year.

Paul Henderson, Metro’s manager of solid waste, said Metro is looking to sign a seven-year deal for a “contingency” landfill, which would likely be outside the regional district and collect between 50,000 and 200,000 tonnes of trash per year.

Existing dumps, including the one at Cache Creek as well as sites in Alberta, Oregon or Washington are potential options, he said, although he noted there will be an open procurement process.

Metro expects to be trucking trash to the new facility in early 2017.

“Likely this would be some remote landfill,” Henderson said.

Metro Vancouver had planned to close the Cache Creek landfill, which is operated by Wastech, at the end of this year as it pursued plans for a $500-million incinerator to burn 250,000 tonnes of the region’s trash. Metro, which has spent $4.5 million since 2012 on investigating waste-to-energy garbage disposal, has since put those plans on hold, blaming the delay on uncertainty around its future garbage volumes.

Henderson noted Metro always knew it would require a contingency dump to handle any overflow that couldn’t be accommodated at the existing incinerator in Burnaby or the Vancouverlandfill in Delta. A Metro report suggests in 2016 that the region will generate about 800,000 tonnes of waste, with about 270,000 tonnes going to the Burnaby incinerator and 400,000 tonnes to the Vancouver landfill.

About 130,000 tonnes will go to Cache Creek, significantly less than the 200,000 tonnes trucked there last year. The province approved a 42-hectare expansion for the Cache Creek dump in 2010, just days before Metro announced it would move away from landfilling its garbage.

Metro Vancouver is also seeking new transfer stations contracts in Surrey, Coquitlam, North Shore, Langley and Maple Ridge. Under its existing contract, Wastech provides transfer services on the North Shore, Surrey and Coquitlam.