What gets thrown away occupies days for trash-collection company engineer

Throwaways require lots of concentration for Alan Gaddy.

As area engineer - Nevada operations for Republic Services, this Valley High School and University of Nevada, Las Vegas graduate's task is ensuring that all the refuse from everyone in the area has minimal environmental impact.

"I've always been interested in the biology of systems and how they interact with humans," Gaddy said. "I think that is what intrigued me to come into this environmental arena."

Gaddy said the Apex Regional Landfill is the nation's largest operating landfill because of the number of people here. Tens of millions of visitors mix with Clark County's 1.9 million residents.

The company's three area transfer stations -- in Henderson, North Las Vegas and 20 miles south in Sloan -- operate around the clock to absorb most of the valley's trash before it makes the trip on Interstate 15 to Apex.

Gaddy said county officials are negotiating a site for a fourth transfer station.

The North Las Vegas station, on Cheyenne Avenue west of Interstate 15, processes 6,000 tons a day. It's the nation's largest under-roof transfer station and is also the site of the company's recycling plant.

Gaddy entered the trash business after he was approached by Republic Services' predecessor, Silver State Disposal Services. He was working as chairman of a Basic Management Inc. complex consortium committee.

The committee was working to gauge the environmental impact of the companies operating in the complex.

Silver State Disposal was closing its landfill near Sunrise Mountain and hired Gaddy to handle Apex's permitting with the Clark County Health District. The 720-acre Sunrise site was the area's landfill from the early 1950s until its closure on Oct. 8, 1993. Apex opened the day Sunrise closed.

In retrospect, the new 2,200-acre landfill opened just in time. The early 1990s was the beginning of a tourism and population explosion that continues to this day.

Less than four years after opening Apex, and shortly after Gaddy became the landfill's general manager, Silver State Disposal was sold for $378 million to what is now Republic Services.

After serving for three years as the company's regulatory compliance manager, Gaddy became Apex general manager; he served in the job for eight years. He then took his current job as area engineer.

Gaddy said his work stays interesting.

"It's a fascinating job because not many people think about what happens to trash after it gets picked up at the curb," he said.

Coming full circle, he is helping to oversee an environmental evaluation of the Sunrise landfill with hopes of eventually returning the land to Clark County.

When Gaddy isn't focused on waste, he focuses on family and soccer. He plays club soccer for one of the area's premier adult teams. And he raises two teenage children in a marriage that's now in its third decade.

Question: Why did Silver State hire you?

Answer: The company was interested in somebody familiar with permitting and good with regulators. Somehow they ran across my name a couple of times when checking with regulators. They approached me and said that they were starting the Apex project and wanted me involved. So I did the air-quality permits and solid-waste permit for Apex.

Question: For eight years you were directed operations for Apex. What does your current job entail?

Answer: I don't worry about the operation details. I now assist the Apex landfill by looking at bigger-scenario pictures such as construction and infrastructure.

Question: Of the 16,000 tons of trash that makes its way out to Apex every day, how much comes through the three transfer stations?

Answer: About 70 percent. The rest comes directly from construction and those types of projects.

Question: With the growth in renewable energy, are there any plans to use the methane gas that the landfill generates from the decomposing trash?

Answer: Right now the gas just burns off in our flare unit at a temperature of about 1,600 degrees Fahrenheit. Instead of burning it, we want to partner with Nevada Power Co. We would produce probably about 1 percent to 2 percent of their gas needs (to run a nearby power plant). There is a great economic value to the renewable energy portfolio they must have. We are talking to them about the practicality of running a pipeline. They are very interested.

Question: How did someone born and educated in Nevada end up at Washington State University?

Answer: In looking for graduate schools, Washington State University had just experienced the Mount St. Helens eruption. I was applying the next semester after that as a research assistant. A professor called me, saying he had received a grant from the Department of Water Resources and the Department of the Interior to evaluate the effect the ash had on all the lakes in the region. I said, "That sounds like a great research project. I'd love to do that." I got a master's degree out of it.

Question: What did you research?

Answer: I evaluated the chemical and physical effects of the ash on the lakes in Idaho, Washington, Oregon and Montana I took Michelle, my girlfriend at the time, and that's how we solidified that relationship; I eventually married her. We spent many nights out on the lakeside trapping zooplankton. We looked at algae growth and how it was affected. It was really, really fascinating.

Question: Did anything surprise you about the effect on the region?

Answer: What sort of surprised me was this. If I were to take a bunch of dirt and throw it into the lake knowing the algae requires sunlight to grow, what would you think would happen?

What is unique about the volcanic ash is if you look at it under a microscope, it's like ground glass. One would think the ash might block light and shade the algae, retarding its growth. But at medium to high concentrations of ash, the algae actually grew better than it would have if the ash hadn't been there at all. Completely different result that I would have thought going in.

Question: You said a highlight of your professional career was obtaining a patent. How did this happen?

Answer: One the unique things at the Kerr-McGee facility is that it is part of a bigger complex inside one federal facility in Henderson. The facility had one common storm-drain system and one of the things we had always been concerned about was chemicals leaving the facility during large rainstorms.

I invented a storm-drain cover that used a big plate of steel and a swimming pool noodle like a corkscrew. Those noodles are chemically resistant. I put the noodle around the bottom of the steel plate. When you would put it on the storm drain it would stop any water from going down into the storm system.

We submitted it to Kerr-McGee's engineering department, they did a patent search and found out there was nothing else like it.