Natural Gas Trash Trucks Coming to Town?

For nearly two decades, Waste Management says it has helped the environment by replacing standard garbage trucks with ones that run on cleaner fuel: natural gas created by recycling trash.

As city officials and Waste Management workers gathered Tuesday at the company’s Long Beach hauling facility to celebrate the deployment of their 1,000th natural-gas-powered recycling truck, they said Belmont Shore residents can look forward in the next year to the NGVs when the company buys smaller trucks to navigate the area's tighter streets.

Waste Management says it now operates the largest fleet of heavy-duty natural gas trucks in North America.

Speakers at the celebration included city officials from both Los Angeles and Orange County and members of various clean air boards, including the South Coast Air Quality Management Governing Board, the California Air Resources Board, and the Coalition for Clean Air.

“To have a commercial entity like Waste Management embrace clean fuels the way they have is not only remarkable,” said Bob Foster, Mayor of Long Beach, “but it’s exactly what’s needed to make a better world for our kids and our grand-kids. I can’t thank them enough.”

“This is a milestone,” said Miguel Pulido, Mayor of Santa Ana. “What’s more fundamental than the air we breathe? We have to be responsible stewards of this planet.”

800 of Waste Management’s 1,000 NGVs operate in California. The company 19 years ago (1992) launched their first natural gas vehicle (NGV) in Palm Dessert. The trucks run on ultra-low carbon fuel created by transforming the methane captured in their landfills. According to the Waste Management website, the use of this clean-burning natural gas in fleet operations can reduce carbon emissions by more than 20% when compared to diesel. In just one year, Waste Management’s 1000 natural gas trucks will not only reduce petroleum dependence by 8 million gallons, they will also eliminate 45,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions.

“Having 800 fewer trash and recycling trucks running on diesel is a big deal for public health,” according to La Ronda Bowen, Ombudsman of the California Air Resources Board. “The number one contributor to Californian’s cancer risk from air pollution is diesel exhaust.”

For Bowen, being able to use the nation’s own trash to turn into clean fuel makes humans “more responsible” than they have ever been in “this civilization.”

At 11:20 a.m., Foster cut the ribbon on the celebrated truck and powered on the engine, which ran on Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) generated from trash and landfill gas captured at the Waste Management’s Altamont landfill in northern California.

While 34 NGVs currently serve 90-95% of Long Beach, none currently operate in Belmont Shore, according to Darrel Kato, Waste Management’s Director of Operations. He explained that the trucks wouldn’t be able to maneuver around the tight alleyways and streets of Belmont Shore and Naples Island. However, Waste Management is purchasing two spec trucks to covert into their garbage trucks that run on CNG, and by the end of this year or early next year, residents of Belmont Shore can expect to breathe cleaner air as NGVs drive down their streets to pick up their trash--trash that he said will soon be the fuel source that will keep these trucks coming back.

Brian Dinh is a UC Irvine Literary Journalism student who is part of a team working for Belmont Shore Naples Patch this summer.