SCA’s Position on Montgomery County’s Trash Overhaul Plans
Updated May 14, 2026
On May 6, the Montgomery County Council voted to postpone until late summer or early fall any discussion and decision to stop burning the Montgomery County’s trash and instead transport it to well-vetted landfills.
The proposal was communicated to the County Council in November and the full plan was presented to them in March by County Executive Marc Elrich in his annual budget proposal.
Council President Natali Fani-Gonzalez spearheaded the delay. She argued that the Council needs more (and more “independent”) information about the transition to landfills and could not focus on the details of the issue amid contentious budget decisions on other matters.
We appreciate that this year’s county budget deliberations are particularly fraught. But we do not agree with Ms. Fani-Gonzalez that a delay was necessary on the waste management decision. Indeed, we support Mr. Elrich’s plan and budget proposal for the waste transition. That plan was formulated after almost two years of detailed analysis by the County’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).
The core of the plan is simple: over a period of six to nine months Montgomery County would stop burning its non-recyclable trash (600,000 tons a year) and instead truck that trash to out of state landfills that meet a host of environmental and safety requirements. The actual hauling would be done by a private waste management company. DEP put out an RFP (request for proposal) from such companies in September 2025; it received several replies in November. But any contract awaits a final decision by the Council as to the budget for this sizable project.
Truck hauling of trash to the nation’s roughly 3,000 landfills is by far the most common waste management system in the U.S. It accounts for the disposal of 65% of trash after recyclable and compostable material is diverted from the “waste stream.” The technology has vastly improved over the past decade, by all accounts, though landfills differ from one another in how they operate.
Under Elrich’s plan, Reworld, the private company that operates the incinerator (located in Dickerson), would have been informed in July that the facility would be shuttered by the end of December. (That 6-month notice is required under the facility’s contract.)
Why does the incinerator need to be closed?
Because it’s the largest single source of pollution—including climate-altering greenhouse gases—in the county. And has been for years.
Because we have been dumping 150,000 tons the toxic ash from the incinerator on a majority Black community in Virginia—putting them at far greater risk than if we landfilled our unburned trash in one of the vetted landfills the County has chosen.
Because it’s 30 years old and has begun to require costly maintenance; most incinerators are shuttered after about 25 years. And most have been shut down nationwide over the last three decades with only one new one built.
And because serious problems have recently occurred. In September 2025, an annual emissions test revealed that the incinerator had been emitting nearly double the permitted limit—and 21 times more than in tests a year ago—of the deadliest chemicals known to science, dioxin and furans. In December, a second breakdown occurred, releasing 50 times the already toxic emissions. There’s no safe emissions limit established for these chemicals. (See links below to our press releases on this issue.)
