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Department of Ecology News Release - December 4, 2007
07-355
YAKIMA – Work to remove 2 million tires at the state’s largest scrap tire pile near Goldendale has been completed on time and under budget through a Washington Department of Ecology (Ecology) contract.
Contractor Entech Inc. has finished the job at the former Tire Shredders location at an approximate disposal cost of 85 cents per tire and a total cost of $1.73 million.
In 2005, the Washington State Legislature approved a $1-per-tire fee to create a fund to pay for properly cleaning up waste tire piles throughout the state. Ecology estimates about 4 million waste tires are stored in 93 piles in 25 counties across the state.
“Entech did a great job cleaning up the site as fast as possible,” said Laurie Davies, acting program manager for Ecology’s Solid Waste Program. “We’re also well on our way to taking care of the rest of the illegally stored tires across the state.”
So far contractors have cleaned up nearly 3 million tires at 19 sites across Washington. Work is currently underway at a scrap tire pile on Yakama Nation land in Central Washington and a cleanup contract for sites in Northwest Washington is planned for 2008. Ecology expects to complete the cleanup of all tire piles across the state by the end of 2009, at a cost of approximately $8 million – funded by the $1-per-tire fee.
More information is available on the Ecology tire website: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/swfa/tires/cleanup.html
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Media contact: Joye Redfield-Wilder, communications manager, 509-575-2610
Copyright © Washington State Department of Ecology. See http://www.ecy.wa.gov/copyright.html.
