DENR rejects residents’ appeal to re-open Payatas

The Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) has reiterated its decision not to allow the reopening of the Payatas landfill despite appeals from residents of Payatas to resume its operations.

In a dialogue with representatives of the Payatas Alliance Recycling Exchange (PARE) Cooperative, DENR officials maintained that the decision to close down the landfill due to numerous environmental violations, and its susceptibility to trash slide was already final.

PARE, whose members are mostly scavengers and junkshop owners, appealed to the DENR to reconsider its decision for the sake of the 2,000 families who rely on the landfill for their livelihood.

DENR Undersecretary Noel Felongco said the Quezon City Sanitary Landfill (QCSLF) has already reached overcapacity and the leachate has already seeped into the Marikina River, which is in violation of environmental laws, particularly Republic Act 9003 or the Ecological Solid Waste Management Act.

He said that while RA 9003 provides that there should be waste segregation at source and only residuals are to be brought to landfills, the same was not the case at QCSLF because it was loaded with mixed garbage.

“There was no technical basis for the DENR to allow the reopening of the Payatas landfill,” said Eligio Ildefonso, Executive Director of the National Solid Waste Management Commission.

He, however, pointed out the need to help the people whose only source of income will be affected by the landfill’s permanent closure.

“The DENR looks after the technical aspect, including the environment and the welfare of the people, while the Quezon City government handles the social aspect like providing alternative livelihood to those who will be displaced by the closure,” Ildefonso explained.

Earlier in August, DENR turned down the request of the Quezon City government to allow the QCSLF to reopen until December this year.

In its report, the DENR-Environmental Management Bureau said that “violations of existing environmental laws and their existing rules and regulations were committed” by the landfill’s operator, IPM Environmental Services, Inc.

A separate report by the Mines and Geosciences Bureau showed that the landfill was “highly susceptible to trash slide” based on its geomorphological and environmental assessments.