As state planning officials prepare to manage what could be the first state-owned landfill in the United States, they enter largely uncharted territory. The agreement governing Casella Waste Systems Inc.’s operation of the West Old Town facility follows typical landfill rules and terms in most respects. There is at least one important exception: the issue of out-of-state waste.

Maine has long been near the center of an unfolding regional story. Eastern seaboard states are increasingly desperate to find places to dump their waste, and the two large companies that dominate Maine’s waste management infrastructure, Casella and Waste Management Inc., are geared to tap that demand and haul in more out-of-state waste.

Although New York is the country’s top waste exporter, Massachusetts is Maine’s primary concern. The Bay State exported 1.5 million tons in 2001, more than twice the 600,000 tons it shipped out in 1997. Compare that to a fully outfitted aircraft carrier, which weighs less than 100,000 tons.

Federal commerce laws say state and local governments cannot limit the amount of waste private contractors move across state borders. States also cannot control how much imported waste privately owned landfills or incinerators accept.

Pennsylvania has become the example of the risks involved. The state’s private landfills accepted 10.7 million tons of waste from New York and New Jersey in 2001. U.S. Rep. James Greenwood, R-Pa., has introduced bills to each congress since 1994 that would give governors limited control over imports. The measure has seen little support. To get a grip on its own situation, Maine placed a ban on landfills in 1989.

Imported trash continued to flow into the state. In 1997, Maine imported 138,000 tons of municipal solid waste. By 2001, the amount had climbed to 220,000 tons. The vast majority of that, almost 200,000 tons, went to two waste-to-energy incinerators: Penobscot Energy Recovery in Orrington and Maine Energy Recovery in Biddeford. About 19,000 tons went to the Pine Tree landfill in Hampden. The Crossroads landfill in Norridgewock took in 1,300 tons.

As the owner the West Old Town facility, the state Planning Office can ostensibly limit the amount of imported waste going into the landfill. But that power has not yet been tested in court.

Bill Wolpin, editorial director of Waste Age Magazine, said other states have banned new landfills from time to time, but Maine appears to be the only one taking an additional step.

“I’ve never heard of a state-owned landfill. There may be some out there,” said Wolpin, who has been an industry observer for 15 years. “But it is definitely unusual.”

The state-corporate relationship creates a conundrum of expectations around the landfill’s use. Public sector operators, like municipalities, traditionally see landfills as a natural resource: something created to serve their communities. For private sector operators like Casella and Waste Management, it’s a business.

“Most of them want to do it the right way and be environmentally sensitive,” Wolpin said. “But their game is going to be to bring in as much waste as they can, all private guys do.”

The agreement between Casella, the state, Georgia-Pacific and West Old Town appears to balance those competing interests. Casella is nevertheless obliged to produce increasing returns on investment for the shareholders who own a majority of the company, and plans to double its size in the next five years. Its $26 million investment in West Old Town promises the site will figure prominently into that plan.

The MERC facility owned by Casella in Biddeford also will play a fundamental role. Like a privately owned landfill, the state cannot limit the amount of waste Casella processes at, or the amount of trucks rolling into the plant. Two aspects of the current agreement will allow Casella to increase the amount of waste it imports into that plant.

First, imported waste turned to ash in the waste-to-energy process becomes in-state waste, and can therefore be dumped at West Old Town. Second, any waste brought to the MERC or PERC facilities, but left unprocessed due to outages or lack of capacity, becomes bypass. All bypass is redefined as in-state waste, and the amount of bypass waste is increasing.

Waste delivered to the state’s four incinerators in Maine increased 5.3 percent in 2001, to 845,000 tons. The amount of bypass increased 30 percent, to 65,000 tons. The wording of the West Old Town agreement, according to George MacDonald, manager of the Planning Office’s Waste Management and Recycling Program, allows Casella to dump bypass at the site.

Assistant Attorney General Francis Ackerman said the state nevertheless has the ability to amend the West Old Town agreement. And it retains power to limit all waste components dumped at the site. The key, Ackerman said, is in how carefully crafted are the 30-year contract’s limitations on the facility’s use.

“If those are well-written,” Ackerman said, “there should be no loopholes that allow anything to take place that the state doesn’t want to take place.”