Environmental nonprofits working to determine impacts of Moody landfill fire

MOODY, Ala. (WBRC) - Environmental nonprofits, like the Cahaba Riverkeeper and the Greater Birmingham Alliance to Stop Pollutions, say they’ve been working around the clock to see how the Moody landfill fire impacts our air, water and public health.

They held a Q&A session on zoom Tuesday afternoon, Jan. 18, about the ongoing fire. Some of these included who’s responsible for checking landfills like this one to ensure there’s no unauthorized waste being dumped. Another person mentioned cutting the budget for state organizations, like the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, where several complaints were submitted about this landfill. These officials shared why that would not be a good idea.

“They will only inspect, like green landfills for instance, which are not regulated, if they receive complaints about regulated waste being present on site,” says Michael Hansen with GASP. “If you defund ADEM, you reduce their funding, they’re going to have even fewer inspectors who we’ll be doing even less proactively, so that is exactly the wrong solution.”

These nonprofits do encourage people to continue to reach out to state and local officials, as well as ADEM and the EPA about the fire and how it’s impacting you and your family.

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