Opponents of the Dairyland Power coal ash landfill presented two petitions with about 100 signatures to the county solid waste committee on Monday.

Chuck Doerr, who is a member of a town of Viroqua group opposing the landfill, presented the petitions and read them to the committee.

One petition commended county solid waste administrator Gail Frie for his proactive stance on the issue, but then asked him to reverse his position of working with Dairyland to site the facility next the existing county landfill for four reasons.

Those reasons included the landfill being a "bad idea" for reasons outlined by a town of Harmony resident Carl Volden that listed pros and cons of a landfill, that Frie' s attempts to mitigate threats to resources will end still end with more ecological threats, that Frie's stance of working with Dairyland is misguided because once Dairyland sites a landfill there will be little local control over the operation, and that the project assumes too much liability.

The second petition asks that the county board reconsider and table or defeat a December 2007 county motion that gave Frie the go-ahead to pursue the project with Dairyland. The committee voted to accepted the petitions into their record.

The county has considered allowing DPC to site their proposed coal ash landfill next to their existing landfill. The site is one of three sites being considered. The other two are in the town of Harmony where a large number of residents have resisted the plan politically.

The proposed landfill is needed to handle coal ash that will be produced once Dairyland completes installation of "scrubbers" that will remove ash and also sulfur dioxide from the smokestack at its Genoa power plant by 2010. The landfill siting process is handled by the DNR and the county has hired a consultant to help guide the county through that process. According to that consultant, patience is the most important thing for county residents to keep in mind as county officials and neighbors follow the siting process.

"You are going to get very impatient with this process very soon," said Hank Koch with the engineering firm Foth and Van Dyke. "This is a lengthy process, three to seven years. The intensity you are experiencing today with all of these questions and decisions bearing in on you will grate on you, so begin to prepare yourself for this. It is real important that you pace yourselves because this is a long process. The more contentious elements are yet to come."

Koch said there will be decision points where opposing viewpoints are on opposite sides of the table and "hostilities will erupt." Koch said the important thing for the solid waster committee to do is define what it is the county wants out of the process.

"It is not a case you can run and hide from this process," said Koch. "It is going to happen. You can choose to be involved or not to be involved. Some counties in the siting of a landfill choose not to be involved, that is a big mistake to the citizens of the county."

Koch said some counties choose to only react when the have to make decisions and others act as a "clearinghouse" for information without taking a position.

"You will find in this process that it will take three to seven years that nobody will look at your interest," said Koch. "The DNR will not. They will look the environmental factors for each and they will find fault with each site and you will say 'What are suppose to do?' We will be there to help you because we do not have Dairyland's interest in mind. We do not have the opponents’ interest in mind. We have the county's interest in mind. So, if the county says we want a safe landfill we are going to tell you what will and will not make a safe landfill.

"The DNR is looking out for the state’s interest but they are not looking out for the county's interest," Koch continued. "Your interests may be at a level higher than what the DNR expects."

"DNR enforces minimum standards which are not good enough for Vernon County geology," said Frie. "Don't depend on DNR to protect us. They will do it to a limit but not to what we need."

Koch said he has been involved in the landfill siting process his whole life in almost every role.

"I have been there as a DNR person, I have been there as the owner of a landfill and I have been on the other side, so I know all sides," said Koch.

Koch said another important element of the siting process is communication with citizens. Pam Pirman is Foth and Van Dyke's communications director and told the committee she will be assisting the county in keeping the public informed about the process.

"You have a very articulate and well-financed group of folks with Dairyland who are very, very adept and very well positioned to get their position out to the public," said Pirman. "Your role as a committee is to be an impartial advocate only for the county interest. You want to advocate for the process and let your constituents know there points in the process where they can get involved."

Koch said he intends to bring the committee a wall chart that shows all of the steps in the siting process and identify key "choke" points in the process where major decisions will be made.

Dairyland Power Cooperative representative Brad Foss said DPC has completed soil and water testing at all three potential sites still under consideration and their engineering firm is moving into preparing "Initial Site Reports." Foss answered questions from the committee and some residents who wanted to know about alternatives.

Foss said DPC continues to look at alternatives for recycling and reuse, including a contact with a company that is developing a process to convert scrubber waste into an inert material. Foss said DPC engineers have also agreed to meet with an engineer from a Calgary, Alberta, Canada, company that has developed coal gasification processes and other processes that burn municipal solid waste.

Foss answered a question about whether ash from a proposed coal-fired power plant in Cassville could be hauled to the Vernon County landfill. Foss said the information was just a rumor and had no idea where that information came from.

Committee member Dennis Brault said the information was presented at a recent showing of the documentary "Keeping the Lights On" in Viroqua. Brault said Clean Wisconsin representative Peter Taglia showed a slide during a presentation that said Alliant had stated in its permit process for the plant that one option considered to dispose of ash was the DPC landfill in Vernon County. Foss said that he had no knowledge of that plan.

Koch said it would be unlikely that a utility would haul ash that far to dispose of it. Brault said it was being considered because Vernon County was closer than the other alternative, which was Wausau.

Frie said the Vernon County operation is self-supporting and since opening and has added a number of recycling programs. Frie said there may be options for taking their operation in another direction and not have to site another landfill in 2020.