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The Celina Sanitary Landfill, 6141 Depweg Road, closed in 2021.
CELINA - There are no plans for the Celina Sanitary Landfill for the foreseeable future, according to an Ohio Environmental Protection Agency official.
During an Ag Education series presentation on Thursday evening, OEPA engineer Edward O'Loughlin said there has been no word on how or if the landfill will be used in the future. The landfill, owned by Republic Services, has been closed since 2021.
Mercer County Agriculture and Natural Resource Director Theresa Dirksen said she had reached out to Republic Services to join the discussion but never heard back from the company.
About 50 people who attended the meeting at St. Charles Senior Living Center heard how the landfill will be monitored for the next 30 years post-closure.
O'Loughlin said the landfill is not in the post-closure stage as the landfill has yet to meet a vegetation requirement to control erosion. At the same time, he noted another seeding event will occur this fall, which officials hope will seal the deal.
The landfill located at 6141 Depweg Road opened in 1976 and sits on more than 180 acres of land, O'Loughlin said. Of that, about 62 acres consist of waste. Officials have said roughly 3.7 million tons of waste had been disposed of at the site prior to its closure.
After the landfill closed, the OEPA prescribed a capping process in order to isolate contaminates. The final cover construction in 2022 included waste relocation from older parts of the landfill to less-filled areas, regrading the existing 1976 caps to a minimum slope to improve drainage and passive gas trench and vent installation, O'Loughlin said.
More notably, 22 acres of repacked soil barriers were constructed and a plastic, textured geomembrane was installed on top of the waste in a process known as capping.
Capping involves placing a cover or "cap" over contaminated material such as landfill waste or contaminated soil. Caps do not destroy or remove contaminants. Instead, they isolate them and keep them in place to avoid the spread of contamination.
Along with the cap installation came cap drainage, as well as 21/2 feet vegetative cover on top of the cap to help prevent erosion.
The site will be monitored for decades to come to ensure there is no explosive landfill gas, surface water or ground water pollution, O'Loughlin said.
Landfill gas is a natural byproduct of decomposing organic materials, O'Loughlin said. The gas is composed about roughly 50% methane, 50% carbon dioxide and a small about of non-methane organic compounds, according to the federal EPA.
Like many residential and agricultural landfills, Celina's landfill consisted mostly of organic material.
Within less than a year of organic material being deposited in a landfill, anaerobic conditions are established and methane-producing bacteria begin to decompose the waste and generate methane. O'Loughlin said the landfill will likely produce landfill gas well into the next century.
Celina has a passive gas system, in which pipes vent landfill gas into the atmosphere. Unlike some larger landfills, Celina's landfill does not produce enough gas to warrant flares, in which the gas is periodically burned, O'Loughlin said. It also doesn't produce enough gas to be captured, converted and used as renewable energy, he said.
Larger landfills can convert landfill gas into energy to use for electricity generation, renewable natural gas or used as medium-Btu gas.
Given methane's explosive nature, O'Loughlin said landfills are required to have an explosive gas monitoring system. Celina's explosive gas system is and will continue to be monitored monthly by a third party until the 30-year post-closure period ends, he said.
In addition to landfill gas monitoring, deep ground watering testing is conducted twice a year. Currently the ground water at the landfill is in detection monitoring, which means the ground water has not been contaminated by the landfill.
Officials also monitor leachate, which occurs when rainwater filters through a landfill and creates contaminated water.
Leachate is collected and transferred off-site, O'Loughlin. About 1 million gallons of leachate were collected and transferred for treatment last year, which he said signifies the landfill is not a high producer of leachate.
After a landfill has completed its post-closure period of 30 years, landfill owners have the option to apply for an Ohio EPA 513 permit. The permit allows for the filling, grading, excavating, building, drilling or mining on land where a hazardous waste or solid waste facility was operated.
Examples of 513 permits in northwest Ohio include the former Richland County landfill, which now serves as the Mansfield Air Force Base fuel depot; a nature trail at the former Ashland County landfill; a bridge and Marathon gas pipeline project at the former Marion City landfill; and an infrastructure project at the former Rossford Landfill.
O'Loughlin noted that a 513 permit for the Celina Sanitary Landfill would require permission from Republic Services, which owns the property. He added there seems to be no plan in place for any such endeavor for the foreseeable future.
There's several reasons why a landfill owner may not seek to repurpose the land, he said. Transforming the property could pose liability issues and expensive insurance costs, he said. The process of repurposing the land would also be expensive.
For the time being, Republic Services will be responsible for the landfill until the 30-year post-closure period is completed.
