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What happens when a landfill runs out of space?

Alexis Marshall Jan 8, 2019
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A truck empties its load of waste at the Shelford Landfill, Recycling & Composting Centre. Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

What happens when a landfill runs out of space?

Alexis Marshall Jan 8, 2019
A truck empties its load of waste at the Shelford Landfill, Recycling & Composting Centre. Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
HTML EMBED:
COPY

Landfills nationwide are starting to fill up. According to the Waste Business Journal, by 2021 the average landfill will only have 15 years of life left. In Tennessee, a landfill that services over a dozen counties has even less time, and despite costly consultations and over a year of debate officials have yet to find a long-term solution.

Correction (Jan. 8, 2019): An earlier audio introduction of this story misstated the timeframe that the landfill has before it reaches capacity. The audio has been deleted.

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