Dive summary:
- After a four-hour hearing, the Department of Environmental Protection decided that the Roxbury landfill in New Jersey could test an industrial deodorant made from potassium permanganate, to help ease residential resentment over the landfill's toxic stench.
- Over 1,400 complaints have been registered against the landfill for the smell in just the past four months.
- Even if it is successful, the deodorant is only a temporary solution; the prosecuting attorney wants the landfill to stop accepting construction waste, which is responsible for the smell, although owners of the landfill say that would take away 60%-70% of their business.
From the article:
“My clients are stuck with a stench that continues to this day,” he said. “They are crying about a horrific smell,” he said. “SEP and DEP have had 120 days to figure this out.”
Marchese became so angry and animated that Wilson told him to calm down, saying “any other judge” would have “sanctioned” him if he’d taken that “tone.”
But later, Kinney and attorney Anthony M. Bucco, representing Roxbury Township, both joined Marchese in a compromise suggestion that would bar Strategic from accepting construction and demolition debris until the first section of the landfill is capped. ...
