Lower Fees For Residents Key Part Of New Waste Disposal Plan

Guilford and Madison have signed a contract with Covanta Energy Corporation for sustainable waste management services. Guilford and Madison, along with Newington and East Hartford, recently signed contracts for services that will include sustainable waste disposal, recycling and composting. Covanta is the largest owner and operator of Energy-from-Waste facilities in North America including local facilities in Wallingford, Bristol and Preston, Connecticut and Springfield, Massachusetts.

Covanta says it offers one stop shopping for waste disposal, recycling and composting. It offered to bundle services for the municipalities to they can save money on disposal costs and get credit back in the form of a rebate for recycling. In addition to the other benefits, Covanta offers shorter queue times for waste haulers, which it says will result in notable efficiencies.

 As part of the deals, Covanta says it will provide outreach funds to each community. These funds can be used for a variety of projects including hazardous household waste collections and energy-from-waste and recycling education programs.

“The Towns of Guilford and Madison have long had a coordinated approach to solid waste disposal. This new agreement extends the cooperation to include a private company, Covanta.  The new agreement lowers the fees that the Towns pay for disposal of our waste and opens the door to savings for our citizens who are using private pick-up companies. And further, it confirms that our waste is converted to usable energy and is not placed in a landfill somewhere,” said Madison First Selectman Fillmore McPherson in a prepared release.

"Our new agreement will provide Guilford and Madison a savings in the cost of our Transfer Station operations. We are looking forward to Covanta's service when our current trash contract ends in June of 2012,” added Town of Guilford First Selectman Joseph Mazza said, also in a prepared release.

“These towns did not want to landfill and we heard them loud and clear,” said Steve Diaz, vice president and regional business manager for Covanta.

Service is slated to begin in 2012 with the agreements ranging from three to five years. The new contracts represent approximately 45,000 tons of municipal solid waste per year.