Andrew Larkin

Environmental Impact and Institutional Adjustment: Application of Foster’s Principles to Solid Waste Disposal

In the United States the average household generates a ton or more of waste every year, excluding major items like automobiles. This amounts to two to four pounds of household trash per day per person. Most of this household waste is being buried in sanitary landfills, thus producing increasing problems of landfill siting in the face of competing uses of land, as well as groundwater contamination by leachates. In addition, valuable resources that could be extracted from the waste are being lost as the wastes are buried. Like other social processes, the method of household waste disposal has evolved over time, and recently the pace of the evolution has been increasing. Prior to a decade or two ago, disposal sites were open dumps, replete with noxious odors, ground and surface water contamination, and insect, bird, and rodent infestation. This condition eventually was seen as unsustainable by experts and other citizens, and the best available knowledge at the time suggested the sanitary landfill as a solution. Sanitary landfill legislation and ordinances responded to the problems of open dumps by mandating frequent burial of wastes. Recently the sanitary landfill has also become problematic for the reasons mentioned-competing uses of land, groundwater contamination, and burial of useable