"Nearby residents have been sounding the alarm about Coffin Butte Landfill for years. Now Sen. Jeff Merkley and other members of Congress are demanding action."
"Coffin Butte, a rapidly growing landfill in Oregon that is leaking explosive levels of methane, has caught the attention of state and federal officials. On August 8, Oregon’s U.S. senators, Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden, and one of its U.S. House members, Val Hoyle, wrote a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency urging it to step up an ongoing investigation of the site.
The legislators’ letter is the result of years of advocacy by residents of Benton County, where Coffin Butte is located. Over the past decade, they’ve watched the landfill grow in size as the amount of trash arriving there has doubled. Then, in 2022, an EPA inspection found 21 spots on the landfill where methane emissions exceeded 10,000 parts per million (ppm) — far over the federal limit of 500 ppm. Residents are concerned about the climate impacts of these emissions, the risk of wildfires posed by this highly flammable gas, and the health effects of exposure to toxic chemicals emitted alongside methane.
Merkley first learned about Coffin Butte Landfill at a town hall this February, where residents spoke about the landfill’s effects on their day-to-day lives and how its emissions contribute to climate change (methane is a potent greenhouse gas that over 20 years traps 80 times as much heat in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide)."
Isobel Whitcomb reports for Canary Media August 19, 2024.
SEE ALSO:
"A Huge Landfill In Oregon Is Spewing Methane. Its Owners Want To Expand." (Canary Media)
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