The problem with landfills

Landfills are scarce on islands because land is scarce. Most land is owned by the government or has been passed down by families. On a small island, there isn’t a lot of land available, and there are higher and better uses for property than to make it a landfill. Which would be more profitable, a landfill or a 500-room luxury resort? The answer is almost any kind of development would be more profitable—and more beautiful.

Landfills are not always easy to implement. The landfill must not be overfilled and to protect the environment should be properly lined with polyurethane, so toxins from the trash do not seep into the ground water. Landfills pose a significant fire hazard as well due to the combustive effects of compacted garbage, and when ignited, the smoke emitted can be as bad or worse than that of an oil refinery.

The long-term plan for a landfill is to ultimately create a beneficial asset from it, such as a recreational park or commercial development. Without a future plan in place, the Caribbean landfills are running out of space, and the trash problem is only getting messier.

One of the key solutions is to manage your waste at the front end to allow every business, hotel etc to understand how they can reduce their waste in the first place. This can be done through a suite of applications by Reb8Solutions giving critical data and analysis on where waste is unnecessary and can be reduced significantly by understanding how and where it can be reduced.