Things are pretty quiet in the City of Appleton right now. Due to the holidays, there are no meetings scheduled until January 9. I did want to take this opportunity to jump back to the Utilities Committee meeting of October 11, 2022 which included a brief but somewhat interesting discussion about the city’s composting efforts.
You can download the full transcript of the discussion below:
The city currently runs a composting project on Outagamie County land but would like to have a composting facility within city limits. Utilities Director Chris Shaw told the Utilities Committee that Appleton’s WPDES (Wisconsin Pollutant Discharge Elimination System) permit was going to be reissued in January of 2023.
The city had asked for compost to be included in that permit, but the DNR had not come back and said they could have a compost facility within the city. As a result, they were going to have to keep their composting program out on county land.
Alderperson Alex Schultz (District 9) asked if staff had any indication why the state was not approving that to which Director Shaw responded that Appleton was a pioneer in biosolids composting, and it was difficult for the state to approve anything that new. Every decision in the state’s decision tree had to be run through a risk assessment, and they weren’t used to dealing with the issues surrounding a municipal composting facility. There were concerns about things such as odor, but beyond that there was the fact that the DNR apparently had not record-keeping mechanism for this sort of project within a city.
So, currently, the city was not approved by the DNR to engage in composting activities at a facility within the city. They were, however, still allowed to compost at the county facility.
Additionally, the city had provided a second submittal to the State of information from a UW Oshkosh study as well as Appleton’s own internal data. So, city staff had done everything in their power to make this work.
[It’s always nice to see bureaucracy shutting down innovation. I understand wanting to make sure there aren’t any health or safety concerns with a new project, but it’s more than a little frustrating to see a new program held back because the bureaucratic regulators don’t know how to handle record keeping for it.]
View full meeting details and video here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=997397&GUID=6AB4DBB7-BBAE-4325-A44A-2B2E48ADEA6F
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