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New $2 Million Trash Compactor In Las Cruces

Installing the new trash compactor
/
SCSWA

 

  Sparks flew as crews cut off the large metal nubs in the floor of the “pit” of the South Central Solid Waste Authority (SCSWA) Amador Avenue Transfer Station. With a line of trash trucks stretching past the Las Cruces Utilities Water Quality Laboratory and concrete still drying on the floor of the Transfer Station, it was a high speed turnover to switch out the old trash compactor for a new “monster” weighing 130,000 lbs, and with a price tag of $1.9 million.

Every day, loads of solid waste are brought into the Transfer Station either on the commercial side of the building where City trash trucks empty their loads into the “pit”, or the southern bay where residents drive in with their trash. A small bulldozer in the pit pushes the trash into the compactor, which tightly compresses it to get the most trash possible into the 18-wheelers for hauling to the Landfill.  

The previous compactor was built to last 10 or 15 years; the SCSWA stretched its useful life t0 23 years. “We called him ‘Frankenmachine’ because it had so many different parts repaired and replaced,” laughed Robert Gorman, SCSWA Transfer Station manager. 

The old compactor chugged along 10 hours a day and accomplished a lot over the years. Typically, every day the Transfer Station sends thirty (30) 18-wheelers hauling 20 tons of trash in each load to Corralitos Regional Landfill, located 15 miles west of Las Cruces alongside I-10.

“The old compactor probably had about $100,000 of repairs over 2 decades,” said Gorman, “but it served long and well… and was also obsolete in many ways. We had to get some replacement parts on eBay.”

Patrick Peck, SCSWA director, explained that a focus on being good fiscal stewards is repairing and extending the life of equipment. “We don’t look at buying a new piece of equipment until we lose reliability of an old machine and until the man-hours of work and down time outweigh the benefit of purchasing a new state-of-the-art machine,” he said. “The downtime for the compactor replacement also means that we could repair the floor of the ‘pit’; the entire project became a long-term investment to manage our community’s solid waste.”

With the compactor down, SCSWA staff has rerouted trash from the pit directly into 18-wheelers, which means more trips to the Landfill, while the concrete floor cures for 7 days. The new compactor should be up and operational the first week of June. 

South Central Solid Waste Authority manages solid waste, recyclables, and works to stop illegal dumping for residents and businesses throughout Doña Ana County. Contact the SCSWA at 575-528-3800 or visit www.SCSWA.net.