An Alternative to the Landfill

A gathering of Siloam Springs business leaders two years ago produced a significant environmental initiative for the city.

At a CEO Roundtable event sponsored by the Siloam Springs Chamber of Commerce, the topic turned to recycling efforts. Those in attendance agreed that rapidly filling landfills were a common community problem, and discussions began about alternative solutions to get rid of the last — and most difficult — 1 percent of the waste stream.

The city’s sanitation and recycling leaders were present and offered to help. They offered to coordinate a collection program for interested companies to store and then transport those materials, ultimately diverting them from the local landfill.

Four organizations — DaySpring Cards Inc., Gates Corp., La-Z-Boy Arkansas and John Brown University — committed to the concept as an addition to their existing recycling efforts.

“Anything they had left over, we gave them the option to go to zero landfill,” said Don Tennison, Siloam Springs’ solid waste superintendent. “We offered it and these are the [organizations] that expressed an interest.”

Rather than the city processing trash to a landfill, it sends the waste that can’t be recycled to Covanta Energy in Tulsa, where it’s burned and used to create energy. The service helped Gates become the first zero-waste plant in its corporation. La-Z-Boy was beat out only by a couple of weeks from being the first plant in its corporation to earn zero-landfill status.

“It was really just the right thing to do,” said Dwayne Buxton, an operations manager at Gates. “This year we really stepped up our efforts to become zero waste and this program really spurred us to finish the project. The city helped us find this avenue.”

Each of the four organizations has since achieved zero-landfill status. In fact, JBU is the first zero-waste university in Arkansas.

“DaySpring is just like any other company; we want to do our part to make sure the planet we leave to future generations is not in complete shambles,” said Mark England, the company’s facilities and environmental health and safety manager. “We called the city and asked ‘What can you do for us?’ and they jumped on it. They got the partnership with Covanta at a reasonable cost.”

Wayne Mays, chamber president, lauded the achievement of four organizations in a city of 15,000 achieving zero-landfill status. “Our city and these organizations have cooperated to make an impact on our planet,” he said. “In so doing, they have improved the future quality of life for our citizens.”