Crew to begin cleanup process at landfill

IOWA CITY - A crew of four city employees has begun to clean up what's left of the landfill fire that cast a large, black plume of smoke over Iowa City, Coralville and North Liberty at the beginning of the summer.

The fire, which was located in single cell of the Iowa City Landfill, is now largely under control, with a few flare-ups from time to time. Superintendent Dave Elias said the cleanup process involves moving hot ash away from the parts of the landfill that are already settled, cooling the ash down and separating it from the dirt, which can be reused to lower operating costs. After it cools, Elias said, the remaining ash will be disposed of in the landfill.

“The goal is for us to get this area back down to bare dirt so we know there's no fire left, and so that we can assess what all we're going to need to do to prepare and restore the system,” he said.

Elias also said the city has begun advertising for five temporary workers to take on the cleanup job so regular landfill staffers can continue to operate the site. The city is also renting a small bulldozer, a large backhoe and a water truck to help with the work. He said he expects the job to take several months, as the crew has between seven and nine acres to work through.

Though the fire has generally been contained in recent weeks, Elias said there have been numerous flare-ups throughout the summer; the most recent was Sunday.

“Every time we kind of start another exploratory process we're watching for that,” Elias said. “But this particular pile had been set and stable for two weeks and nothing had caught - and then last Sunday, all of a sudden, there was a 10-foot circle that was smoking and flaming.”

Though engineers initially estimated the fire would cause around $5 million worth of damage - $1 million to control and clean up the fire, and $4 million to repair the damaged cell - Elias said the latest figures place repair costs at as little as $2 million. If that's the case, it puts the total cost of the landfill fire at $3 million.

“We've paid for quite a bit of it already, so we're hopeful that that cost will come down to that,” Elias said. “But no guarantees.”

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