waste.exposed records material, publicly documented problems in how solid, organic, hazardous, medical, electronic and industrial waste is collected, processed, recycled, recovered, burned, landfilled, exported or governed in the United States and its territories. A problem qualifies when it affects health, the environment, essential service, public cost, or the viability of the system handling it. Business news counts only when it affects service, the environment or public money.
Landfills · Waste-to-energy · Recycling programs · Plastics and packaging · Organics and composting · Hazardous waste · E-waste and batteries · Medical and biohazard · Construction and demolition, coal ash and industrial · Illegal dumping and litter · Collection service · Exports and interstate flows · Governance, affordability and equity. A state counts as researched when all 13 have been searched for it.
Each finding is scored on five components from 0 to 2. Every point rests on cited evidence. Missing data earns no points, and mixed evidence takes the lower score.
| Component | 0 | 1 | 2 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Health or environmental harm | None documented | Plausible or localized, such as odor or a limited exceedance | Confirmed, acute, widespread or long-lasting, such as groundwater contamination or a fire with evacuations |
| Essential service | None | Limited or short-lived | Major or prolonged loss of collection, disposal or recycling capacity |
| Scale | Minor or unknown | Material local impact | Large population, multi-community, multi-state, tribal, regional or national |
| Duration | Isolated or resolved | Ongoing or recurring | Prolonged, escalating or repeatedly unresolved |
| Regulatory or financial significance | Narrow, no formal action | Official response, or a material asset or funding concern | Emergency declaration, major enforcement or consent decree, facility failure or closure, severe funding gap or bankruptcy |
Scores of 8 to 10 are shown as Critical, 6 to 7 as High, 4 to 5 as Moderate and 0 to 3 as Low. Findings are ranked within a category, never against each other across categories.
Each state has a regulatory posture describing how its law treats facilities that use post-use materials as a manufacturing feedstock.
The posture describes the law as its sources state it. It is not an endorsement of any technology or of any position on it.
Findings come from public sources: federal and state agency records, court records, local government records, company filings, news reporting, nonprofit reports and academic work. Each finding lists every source with its publisher and date, and says how it was verified. The first baseline, dated October 10, 2026, was researched from search results: each of its records says the source page was not opened directly, and where a page showed no date the record says which date was used instead. Later runs re-verify findings against the source pages.
No private individuals are named, and no private residences are mapped. Statements follow the source: "alleged", "cited for", "agreed to pay".
This is a ranked set of discoverable issues, not a census. A state with few findings may have problems the searched sources did not report. Missing records do not prove absence.
The full live feed is public at /api/waste/feed, with a summary at /api/waste/summary and the list of runs at /api/waste/runs.