BANGOR DAILY NEWS • April 20, 2023
Thousands of pounds of sludge laced with human waste were piling up in wastewater treatment facilities across the state at the end of February. The treatment plants know how to manage the sludge: They wait for it to be picked up by the trash company Casella Waste Systems and sent to Maine’s state-owned landfill, Juniper Ridge, in Old Town. But at the end of February, Casella stopped taking the sludge, pushing wastewater facilities to the brink. According to more than 1,000 pages of emails, notes and memos exchanged between the state, Casella and others, instead of collaborating and discussing potential solutions, Casella continued to push to overturn a law passed last year that restricted Casella’s ability to get stabilizing waste for the landfill. The records also make clear that there is still a problem: too much sludge and not enough places to put it.