U-R update

MILLEDGEVILLE, Ga. — Although it’s technically been shut down since 2007, a more permanent closure of the old Baldwin County landfill is underway.

The project isn’t cheap. The venture, which is required by state officials, will cost about $3 million.

J. Robin “Robbie” Blanton, vice-president with Oasis Construction Services Inc., discussed the latest plans concerning the closure during a meeting with members of the Baldwin County Board of Commissioners last week.

Commissioners hired Oasis about a year ago to take on the project.

At that time, the county was under pressing deadlines from the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) to meet state guidelines.

“During the process of working on the documents to get the project to bidding, we identified that this site would be a good candidate for an alternate closure system,” Blanton told commissioners. “That consists of an engineered turf synthetic system, called closure turf, which is a proprietary and addititive product.”

In order to comply with state deadlines, Blanton said he had provided commissioners with more accurate information than the numbers they had been working under from 2008 and 2009.

Blanton said the bidding process went fine earlier this year, but it didn’t really produce the type numbers at what he described was the target range that had been sought.

In February, Blanton said Oasis entered into a permitting process with the Georgia EPD for an alternate funding system on behalf of the county.

He told commissioners the firm has come up with a proposal, which he described as a turnkey design-built package.

“It includes supply and installation of the closure turf,” Blanton said. “It also includes services that Oasis is going to provide under standard cap from the original proposal of about a year ago. And so what this is going to do, once the soil part is complete, and we begin to put this proprietary system on there, all of those components from the time we are able to get it approved by the state and get your final closure certificate, would be included in this package.”

He said he and Baldwin County Manager Ralph McMullen had been working on plans to use county staff to complete the soil portion of the project and get it ready.

Once the soil part is figured out, he said he believes that Oasis will be able to come within with the county’s original estimates of around $3 million.

Commission Chairman Sammy Hall said the landfill has been closed for a number of years, “but this is an official closure that would be approved by EPD and a permanent type closure.”

The county stopped accepting waste at the landfill in 2007, Blanton said.

Permanent closure of the landfill includes having a liner on the bottom, as well as the top, Blanton said.

“The standard cap would be putting dirt on top of that, and that’s what we’ve been trying to avoid because that brings issues with vegetation,” he added. “This system that we’re talking about — we’re trying to make it competitive with that standard cap, but the real savings for y’all is over 30 years, because you don’t have to keep mowing grass….”

The landfill consists of 22-acres.

Commissioner Henry Craig asked if EPD had approved the new proposed technology.

“We don’t have the final approved letter, yet,” Blanton said. “We have gone through a series of comments. We submitted a package back to them a few weeks ago.”

He told commissioners that he didn’t anticipate any substitutive changes in regards to plans for the project.

Hall said the goal is to try to complete the permanent closure of the landfill this fall.

“That’s our goal,” he said. “We’ve been talking about this for a long time, so we need to get it done.”

Commissioners later unanimously approved moving forward with the project.