RD260 - Annual Report on the Waste Tire Pile Cleanups in Virginia


Executive Summary:
Introduction

Chapter 101 of the 2003 Acts of the Assembly included a provision that increased the Virginia tire recycling fee from $0.50 to $1.00 for a 3 year period, with all additional revenue dedicated for the removal and recycling of tires from waste tire piles. It also required the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to submit a report by December 1 of each year to the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources and the Chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture, Chesapeake and Natural Resources on the use of these funds and the progress in cleaning up tire piles. This report is submitted to fulfill this requirement.

2005 Activities

During 2005, DEQ completed two major cleanups begun in 2004 as discussed in the 2004 Report to the Virginia General Assembly. These included the most challenging cleanup project ever undertaken by DEQ, the Lee Farm pile on the banks of the Mattaponi River in Caroline County and the cleanup of the defunct Tire Recyclers, Inc. facility in Charles City County. Photographs of both sites have been included in the Appendix.

In late 2004, DEQ began “Clean Sweep”, a state-wide, multi-contractor effort to rid Virginia of the remaining 280 piles by 2006. However, the project was suspended in November, 2005 due to a looming cash flow deficit. It was later determined that all funds to be available from the 2003 tire recycling fee increase were insufficient to complete the entire scope of the Clean Sweep effort, due mainly to increased costs and larger than expected amount of tires in many piles. 136 piles remain to be cleaned up.

The 2005 performance is as follows:

Lee Farm - Caroline Co.
Tires Removed: 605,500, Cost: $1,278,500

TRI - Charles City Co.
Tires Removed: 1,003,800, Cost: $552,090

Clean Sweep - (prior to suspension)
Tires Removed: 2,539,900, Cost: $7,066,121

Total
Tires Removed: 4,149,200, Cost: $8,896,711

2003-2005 Results

The 2003 Report to the General Assembly documented DEQ’s 10-year history of tire pile cleanups. The 2003 fee increase gave DEQ more resources to take more aggressive actions. First, in 2003, End User Reimbursement payments for cleanup of tire piles were doubled to $100 per ton ($1 per tire) and a plan to cleanup the 5 largest remaining piles (“Big 5 Plan”) was initiated. In 2004, the Big 5 Plan was completed which cleaned up the 5 largest tire piles in Virginia and $100 reimbursements continued. The 2005 activities and results are reported above.

Together, these activities and projects have had the following results:

2003 - $100 per ton & Big 5
Tires Removed: 1,657,000, Cost: $1,349,525

2004 - $100 reimbursements
Tires Removed: 369,000, Cost: $ 369,128

2005 - Lee Farm, TRI & Clean Sweep
Tires Removed: 4,149,200, Cost: $8,896,711

Total Tires Removed: 6,175,200, Cost: $10,615,364

Financial Management

The 2003 fee increase was designed to provide $7,800,000 over its 3-year life to clean up an estimated 4,500,000 tires. In actuality, DEQ has cleaned up 6,175,200 tires and expended $10,615,364, the balance paid from deposits to the Waste Tire Trust Fund prior to 2003.

Of 339 piles in Virginia in 2003, 136 now remain to be cleaned up. Based on a DEQ analysis using the Clean Sweep experience to-date, the remaining 136 piles contain an estimated 2,500,000-3,000,000 tires. At an estimated cost of $2 per tire, complete cleanup would cost an estimated $6,000,000.