CONCORD, N.H. — The House Environment and Agricultural Committee held a public hearing on Wednesday for a House bill, which aims to limit the placement of out-of-state waste going into landfills in New Hampshire.
State Rep. Nick Germana, D-Keene, sponsored the bill and testified in support of it. He said when he previously worked on a study commission looking at out-of-state waste, the committee was told by the Attorney General’s Office that “the interstate commerce policy is not absolute, and there are ways in which a state can challenge the interstate commerce clause.”
Germana said the bill in question proposes a cap of 15 percent on out-of-state waste for future landfills. For landfills in operation now, there would be a 30 percent cap by the year 2030. Citing the 2023-2024 Biennial Solid Waste Report, he noted about 39 percent of waste in New Hampshire landfills comes from out of state.
“The good news is that the amount is down from the previous years. It’s about a 25 percent decrease in the amount of out-of-state waste… The bad news is that the waste we take in is increasingly made up of stuff that states around us will not take,” Germana said.
He referenced household items like mattresses, bedding, clothing, and carpets as waste that surrounding states do not allow to be dumped in their landfills.
“I think by structuring it this way — 30 by 2030 for current operators, and 15 percent for new landfills after that point — is a reasonable approach to the interstate commerce clause. If we’re saying, ‘You can still take a third of your waste from out of state,’ I don’t think that’s an undue burden,” he said.
Germana continued, “My understanding is that operators would charge an out-of-state hauler somewhere between $85 and $115 per ton for out-of-state waste… And people are not going to stop bringing their waste here, because we’re talking about…things that they do not landfill in Massachusetts. It’s got to go somewhere, and if it’s not New Hampshire, it’s going to end up going someplace west, like Ohio.”
State Rep. Peter Bixby, D-Dover, asked Germana how much waste New Hampshire sends out of state each year, and Germana said it exports about 10 percent.
Ray Breslin, of Londonderry, who came to speak in support of the bill, expressed concerns about the amount of out-of-state waste and lack of oversight in state landfills.
“It’s not reasonable to accept waste from out of state, we have plenty of our own waste right here. We should have something to say about that… We don’t want to stop interstate commerce — everything comes in that we need — but we don’t need waste from another state,” Breslin said. “We have landfills, and they have to be managed. We have to have oversight, and I’m not sure we have that sufficiently.”
Henry Veilleux, a lobbyist for Waste Management, Inc., spoke in opposition to the bill. He explained that other states have tried enacting similar laws. He said there have been a number of cases that had gone to the U.S. Supreme Court, which declared it violated the interstate commerce clause.
“If you look at Turnkey Landfill, it’s 29 miles from the Massachusetts border, and 50 from Maine. It’s closer to our bordering states than some places in the state of New Hampshire… Landfill operators and developers invest a lot of money, it’s not cheap to build and operate landfills (and) stay in compliance. Any time the state tries to impact the free market, there’s always repercussions. Bills like this may impact future investments,” Veilleux said.
He added that, if the state wanted no out-of-state waste coming into New Hampshire, it could build its own landfill and say it’s only going to take in-state waste.
The bill was not voted on during the meeting, and the subject will be discussed further in subsequent meetings.