Bangor officials outline timeline, private investment and public-education needs for reopened Municipal Waste Hub

Aaron Hootery, Public Works Director, told the Bangor City Infrastructure Committee Monday that the regional facility formerly called the MRC has been rebranded as the Municipal Waste Hub and is again accepting material at the reopened Hamden site.

Hootery said the Municipal Waste Hub is operating as a hub for 15 member communities that together represent about 200,000 people; Bangor supplies roughly 25% of the hub’s annual waste. He said the privately funded reopening — led by Innovative Resource Recovery in a 90/10 ownership partnership through a company called Municipal Waste Solutions (MWS) — aims to pull saleable commodities and organics out of incoming loads, reduce landfill disposal and produce renewable natural gas from organics.

The Municipal Waste Hub’s services and investment matter because they affect Bangor’s disposal costs, local waste-handling operations and the city’s ability to meet state diversion targets. Committee members were briefed on the hub’s equipment upgrades, oncoming anaerobic digesters and a phased timeline for bringing all member…