Incinerator

The Fosston Incinerator and Recycling Center are open to the public and accepting wastes from self-hauling.

Residents entering any portion of the facility must wear a face covering to protect our staff and other visitors from COVID-19.  We appreciate your cooperation during this difficult time and we aim to continue to provide our residents with all our services.

If you must bring to our facility demolition or bypass materials we are only accepting these when social distancing can be accomplished.  Our staff cannot assist residents with loads and material sorting as normal.  Use the scale phone (in the brown box), charge accounts and telephone office staff for questions of facility operations at this time.

Fosston Incinerator  218-435-6501  Crookston Transfer Station  218-281-6445  

Polk Co. Landfill  218-281-5419

It is our goal to continue to allow recycling and self-haul bagged garbage services but things are changing so rapidly we will update as needed.

Please note: For disposal information, please see materials accepted at Recycling Center.

Polk County Solid Waste Management, located in Northwest Minnesota, participates in a Regional integrated Solid Waste Management program, which includes five adjoining counties:

• Beltrami County
• Clearwater County
• Mahnomen County
• Norman County
• Hubbard County

Polk County made the decision to utilize a waste combustor for their solid waste management.

Operation

In August of 1988, the waste-to-energy (WTE) plant began processing municipal solid waste (MSW) using two 40 ton per day mass burn starved air type waste combustors. The facility has operated without major incident since startup, and within permitted limitations of Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), and has processed over 763,000 tons of MSW from 1988 to present. 

In 1996, the Materials Removal Facility (MRF) was installed and the upfront separation of MSW was started, removing recyclable materials as well as non-burnable or objectionable items. The MRF has processed over 30,120 tons of recyclable items from 1996 to present.

Steam Power

The facility has three steam customers; J. Rettenmaier (JRS), Minnesota Dehydrated Vegetables Inc. (MDV), and Specialty Products and Technologies Inc. The facility also can generate power with a steam turbine generator.

Landfill & Transfer Station

Along with the incinerator Polk County operates a landfill located near Gentilly (15764 270th St. SW Crookston, MN 56716) and a transfer station in Crookston.  Hours Monday thru Friday are 7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. all loads must be scaled by 3:30 p.m. to be unloaded.

Employees

There are 32 employees at the Fosston facility, 4 employees at the Landfill and 7 employees at the Transfer Station in Crookston. A number of the employees hold special licenses or degrees to be able to do their job for Polk County and some employees are in apprenticeship program with the facility for Boiler License and Waste Combustor license from the MPCA and the Department of Labor and Industry of State of Minnesota.

Drop-off Hours

The Solid Waste Facilities in Fosston run a 24-hour a day drop off of recyclables and municipal household garbage in the compactor, and also a drop off facility for non-burnable and objectionable items and Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) with operational hours of Monday  through Friday 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.  Special Burns are from 8:30 am to 3:30 pm.