County Draft Report May Overestimate Landfill Needs : Environment: The head of one watchdog group says the result is that the Sanitation Districts will be less committed to waste reduction and recycling.

A report by Los Angeles County sanitation officials appears to overstate the disposal capacity local communities will need if they comply with a new state law that limits landfill dumping.

The draft environmental impact report, issued Aug. 31 by the Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts, argues that substantial new dump space will be required even if area cities meet the goals of the new law, which mandates a 25% diversion of waste going to landfills by 1995 and a 50% reduction by the year 2000.

But in computing future disposal needs, the report uses a different method than specified in the law, state officials said in interviews with The Times. Consequently, the report shows a need for about 15% more landfill capacity than would have resulted from using the law’s formula.

Scaling back the estimate of landfill demand by 15% would not erase the report’s basic conclusion that new dump space will be needed. However, it could have some effect on the number or the timing of new landfills.

The situation is likely to be seized upon by dump opponents, who see sanitation officials as eager to build landfills but cool toward recycling.

The law, Assembly Bill 939, allows cities and counties to consider population growth in computing the volume of required waste reduction. And the draft report puts the annual population growth of Los Angeles County at 1% between now and 2000.

However, the report also factored in a 1.5% growth rate for per capita trash generation--based on historical data suggesting the garbage produced by the average person is increasing at that rate.

Use of the 1.5% growth factor pumps up the county’s projected trash volume by more than 9,200 tons per day by the year 2000. The report shows 50% of that amount being diverted but 50% going to landfills--raising the estimated need for landfill space by more than 4,600 tons, or about 15%, per day.

But the law does not appear to permit the use of the 1.5% trash-growth factor, two state officials said.

The law allows consideration of “increases or decreases in population and not increases or decreases in” the average person’s trash production, said an aide to Assemblyman Byron Sher (D-Palo Alto), author of AB 939. “As the law is written right now, it appears pretty clear that that kind of addition or growth factor could not be” considered, the aide said.

“What they’re saying may have some historical precedents down there, but it’s not specifically allowed in the statute,” agreed Chris Peck, a spokesman for the California Integrated Waste Management Board, which administers the law.

A sanitation districts official disputed these contentions, saying the law must consider society’s growing wastefulness.

Don Nellor, chief of planning and engineering for the districts’ Solid Waste Management Department, said he did not “see how you can get around taking that into account. . . .It would be foolhardy for solid waste planners to ignore the historical reality.”

But the head of one environmental group said waste diversion should be measured only against current trash volumes. She said the report’s use of a growth factor is “completely counter to the spirit” of the law.

“I think it’s an effort to secure more landfill capacity than would really be needed if those goals are met,” said Jill Ratner, Southern California regional director of Citizens for a Better Environment, a statewide environmental group involved in waste disposal issues.

“I think that the County Sanitation Districts are trying to protect themselves, because they’re afraid that people will continue to grow more and more wasteful,” Ratner said. “Regardless of the intent, the effect is to reduce the county’s commitment to source reduction and recycling.”

Ratner said she will raise the issue in written comments on the draft environmental report, which will be the subject of public hearings in October.

The debate is complicated by the fact that individual cities--not the Sanitation Districts-- are covered by the law, and subject to the 25% and 50% trash diversion goals. The districts own and operate landfills that take trash from their 78 member cities. But it is the cities that must file compliance plans with the state waste management board.

The districts have helped organize cities into regional groups and have committed up to $1 million to help them plan recycling and waste reduction strategies.

The draft environmental report, co-sponsored with the districts by the Los Angeles Department of Public Works, called for extending the lives of seven existing public and private landfills, whose permits will lapse in the next few years.

The landfills needing expansion include Sunshine Canyon, Lopez Canyon and Bradley West in the San Fernando Valley, Chiquita Canyon in the Santa Clarita Valley and Scholl Canyon in Glendale, according to the report.

The report said another big public landfill will be needed by 2001 to ensure sufficient disposal capacity for the county. Blind Canyon above Chatsworth and Towsley and Elsmere canyons in the Santa Clarita Valley were identified as feasible sites for the next big dump, along with Mission, Rustic and Sullivan canyons in the Santa Monica Mountains, which together are considered a single site.

The report said that as an alternative to a new dump in the local mountains, large volumes of trash could be hauled 200 miles by rail to one of two remote landfill sites proposed by private firms in San Bernardino and Riverside counties.