What Can and Cannot Go in a Dumpster in Colorado

People arriving in Greeley from almost anywhere else bring assumptions about waste rules that do not survive contact with Colorado. There is no single statewide list of banned materials. Beyond a short list of things the legislature has banned outright, what a landfill refuses is set facility by facility, in the operating plan that facility works to. And a Colorado landfill is not authorized by the state at all — it is authorized by the county, through a Certificate of Designation under C.R.S. § 30-20-102. That certificate attaches to the disposal facility, not to whoever hauls to it.

On top of that sits a city layer that most Colorado towns do not have. Greeley licenses the people who move refuse within the city, and it says so by section number. So the honest answer to “what can go in the container?” in this market has three parts: what the state bans, what the facility will take, and what the City expects of the property.

What goes in without a second thought

The large majority of what comes out of a Greeley house or job site is ordinary mixed debris and it is uncomplicated:

• Furniture, mattresses, box springs, carpet and pad, curtains, general household goods
• Lumber, framing, sheathing, trim, doors, windows, cabinetry, countertops
• Drywall, plaster and lath, insulation, subfloor, flooring of all kinds
• Asphalt shingle and roofing felt from a tear-off
• Siding, fencing, decking, sheds, playsets
• Scrap metal, appliances that carry no refrigerant, sinks, tubs, toilets, cast iron pipe
• Clean concrete, brick, block, stone, tile, asphalt and excavated dirt — but as a dedicated load in a small container, not mixed with the rest
• Yard waste, brush, branches, sod and stumps — often better routed to compost, for reasons below

Weight is what decides which box that goes in. Our sizing guide covers the reason Greeley’s older housing stock makes that question sharper here than in a newer market.

The things Colorado actually bans

Electronics. Colorado has banned electronic devices from its landfills since 1 July 2013, under C.R.S. § 25-17-303. Televisions, monitors, computers, printers, laptops and similar devices need an e-waste route, not a container. The City’s own clean-up event refers residents to Weld County e-waste collections for exactly this reason. The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s solid waste program is on 303-692-3320; cdphe.colorado.gov publishes the rules.

Waste tires. Tires are handled through registered channels in Colorado and are refused locally at the gate. Under the state’s solid waste regulations no person may transport ten or more waste tires without CDPHE registration, with manifests and an annual report. Practically: tires do not go in the box. The City’s Spring Clean-Up will take a maximum of four tires under 20 inches per household with the rims removed, and there are permitted tire facilities in Weld County for anything beyond that.

Notice what is not on that list. Colorado has no statewide yard-waste landfill ban. The landfills serving this region accept it. That is the opposite of the rule in several other states, and it catches people out in both directions.

Household hazardous waste, and the best free service in Greeley

This is the paragraph worth keeping. Paint, stain, solvents and thinners, pesticides and herbicides, pool chemicals, automotive fluids, motor oil, antifreeze, fuel, aerosols, batteries and fluorescent tubes cannot go in a container. Not a small amount, not “dried out,” not at the bottom under something else. They are household hazardous waste and they have their own route.

And in Greeley that route is free. Weld County’s household hazardous waste facility is at 1311 North 17th Avenue, Greeley, open Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., on (970) 400-2217. It is available at no charge to every Weld County resident. The published limits are:

• 200 pounds per household per visit
• Nothing in a container larger than five gallons
• No leaking containers
• No plastic bags — bring material in its original containers or in a box
• Electronics and appliances are not accepted at this facility

If you are clearing a garage that has been accumulating since the 1980s — and in a city where roughly 46 percent of the housing predates 1980, that is a common job — sort the shelf of paint cans and the fuel cans out before we arrive, take them to 17th Avenue, and the rest of the job becomes simple. Details are published at weld.gov.

Appliances, refrigerant and scrap metal

Metal appliances without refrigerant — ranges, washers, dryers, water heaters, dishwashers — are ordinary scrap and are straightforward. Anything containing refrigerant, which means refrigerators, freezers, air conditioners and dehumidifiers, needs the refrigerant recovered by a qualified technician before disposal. The City’s Spring Clean-Up limits Freon-containing appliances to one per household, which tells you how the material is treated locally. Tell us before delivery if an appliance of that kind is in the job and we will tell you how to handle it.

Yard waste, and the difference between clean wood and construction lumber

Because Colorado has no yard-waste ban, brush and branches can be landfilled here. They often should not be, because there are better routes. The City of Greeley runs the Greeley Organic Waste (GROW) Center — 970-673-3718 — which takes grass clippings, leaves, plants, limbs and branches, Christmas trees, and clean wood: lumber that is unpainted and untreated. There is also commercial composting in the county, including a long-established operation at Eaton on 970-454-3492.

Read the phrase “unpainted and untreated” carefully, because it is the whole distinction. Painted trim, stained decking, pressure-treated posts, engineered sheet goods and nailed-together framing are not clean wood. A demolition load of old framing with nails, painted baseboard and sheet goods in it is a container load, not a compost load. A pile of storm-broken limbs off a shade tree is the opposite. Our yard waste and brush guide and the yard waste service page work through which is which.

Asbestos: an air quality matter in Colorado, and the thresholds are tight

Asbestos does not go in a container, ever, and in Colorado it is regulated as an air quality issue rather than as a solid waste issue. The rule is CDPHE Regulation 8, Part B, administered by the Air Pollution Control Division on 720-507-5136.

The single-family trigger levels are unusually low and they surprise people: 32 square feet, 50 linear feet, or the volume of a 55-gallon drum. Above that, removal requires ten working days’ notification, and notification is required for any demolition regardless of quantity. Published fees include a $60 notice and a $180 single-family permit. Buildings constructed after 12 October 1988 are exempt from the inspection requirement.

Why this matters so much in Greeley: the median home here was built in 1985, about 7.2 percent of the housing dates from 1939 or earlier, and roughly 29 percent was built between 1960 and 1979. Popcorn ceiling texture, vinyl floor tile and the mastic under it, pipe and duct wrap, and some siding and roofing products from that era can all contain asbestos. Thirty-two square feet is a small bathroom floor. Get an inspection before demolition, not after. Then we handle the clean debris and the abatement contractor handles theirs.

Lead paint, and a Colorado quirk worth knowing

Federal lead renovation, repair and painting rules apply to compensated work that disturbs painted surfaces in housing and child-occupied facilities built before 1978. In Greeley, a very large share of the housing predates that date, so this is not a footnote here — it is a routine question on a routine remodel.

The Colorado quirk: Colorado is not an EPA-authorized state for the lead program, so firms certify with the EPA directly rather than through a state agency. epa.gov publishes the firm and renovator certification requirements. If you are hiring someone to renovate a pre-1978 Greeley house, that is a fair question to ask them before work starts. Our older homes guide goes into both programs in more detail.

Liquids, fuel and pressurized containers

No liquids of any kind, no fuel, no propane cylinders, no compressed gas bottles, no drums with residue in them, and no medical or biological waste. Empty and dry is the standard for anything that once held something. This is not a company policy; it is what the receiving facility requires and what the fire code expects of a container standing on an occupied property.

Two Greeley code provisions worth knowing

The City defines refuse broadly at Greeley Municipal Code § 20-974 — garbage and all other waste matter or discarded or unused material, including salvage, scrap metal, lumber, appliances and vehicles, and specifically “upholstered furniture… used or stored outdoors in any unroofed area.” A couch on the porch is legally refuse in Greeley. That is a genuinely useful thing to know if you have been meaning to deal with one.

And § 12-269(b) puts the obligation on the property owner in plain words: “All refuse and debris remaining as a result of the demolition or repair of any buildings or the erection and completion of any buildings shall be removed following substantial completion of the work.” The same chapter, at § 12-272, makes it a violation for anyone other than the person who placed a container to disturb it or its contents — which is the polite legal basis for asking the neighbors not to fill your box. The code is published at the City’s Municode library, and Greeley 311 answers on (970) 351-5311.

Loading rules that come from the fire code, not from us

Greeley has adopted the 2021 International Fire Code at § 22-454, effective 1 January 2023, and makes no amendment to Section 304. Three practical consequences:

• Under Section 304.3, a dumpster must not be stored inside a building or placed within five feet of a combustible wall. Every roll-off we place is far over the size threshold in that section, so the five-foot rule applies to all of them.
• Containers over 40 gallons holding combustible rubbish are required to have lids under the same section — worth knowing for the smaller cans on a job site.
• Materials susceptible to spontaneous ignition, such as oily rags, belong in a listed disposal container, not loose in a roll-off. Stain rags and linseed-oil rags are a real cause of job-site fires and this rule exists for a reason.

The Greeley Fire Prevention Bureau answers placement questions on (970) 350-9510.

And cover the load

One of the landfills serving this region publishes that all incoming loads are subject to random inspection and that all uncovered or unsecured loads will be charged double. Weld County’s published residential design wind is a 115 mph three-second gust, and Front Range downslope windstorms are genuine — the January 1982 event produced gusts recorded at 137 mph. Tarp the box.

When in doubt, ask before it goes in

A thirty-second phone call is cheaper than a rejected load. Tell us what you are unsure about and we will tell you whether it goes in the container, to 17th Avenue, to compost, or to a specialist. Call (970) 888-6911.

More on the local permitting side in the Greeley permit guide, on who answers which question in who do I actually call, and the rest of the common questions on our FAQ page.