The regional trash-to-energy plant in Hartford has submitted the necessary application to become a full-time transfer station when it stops burning garbage next summer, a move that’s expected to increase costs to cities and towns.

The Materials Innovation Recycling Authority announced the plan in December 2020 but learned in July that it needed the state’s permission to change its operation. On Sept. 14, the quasi-public agency sent $30,250 in fees to the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection along with a request to ship up to 6,000 tons of garbage a week from its South Meadows plant to out-of-state-landfills until 2027.

MIRA plans to shut down the trash-burning operation in June 2022 after 34 years. In a recent presentation, the agency projected that shipping garbage rather than processing it will raise the tipping fees paid by 48 communities to $114 to $119 per ton in fiscal year 2023, up from $105 per ton this year.

After five years, the tipping fee could reach $139 to $146 per ton.

MIRA is proposing transferring up to 435,000 tons of garbage each year to landfills in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, South Carolina and Alabama. The agency is seeking a higher weekly limit in order to accommodate the several times a year when it receives a heavier volume of garbage.

The plan would significantly reduce traffic in and out of the 80-acre, Maxim Road facility in Hartford, MIRA says; truck traffic would drop about 22% and overall traffic, including employee vehicles, would drop 44%.

That’s because the capital city’s facility would transfer just 275,000 tons of waste a year. The rest, about 130,000-160,000 tons, would be trucked out-of-state directly from existing transfer stations in Essex, Torrington and Watertown, which currently serve as collection points on the way to Hartford, according to the application.

In 2020, MIRA burned nearly 550,000 tons of garbage at the aging processing plant in Hartford, which suffers frequent equipment breakdowns and struggles to run at two-thirds its capacity, the agency reported during an Oct. 14 presentation.

MIRA decided to end that operation after failing to secure funding for facility upgrades or a comprehensive redevelopment of its facilities.

MIRA is now evaluating several proposals for the new transfer operation in the hopes of awarding a contract by December.

The agency has contracts with 48 cities and towns until 2027, but gives them an option to opt-out each March. If MIRA were to eliminate that option and require them to commit to five years of service, tipping fees could be $6 to $9 cheaper, the presentation said.

The tipping fee for fiscal year 2023 should be available by the end of February.

Some of the proposals MIRA received would require towns to deliver their waste to different destinations. Some would require MIRA to continue burning trash past July 1, 2022 to allow for a later start date for transferring.

Rebecca Lurye can be reached at rlurye@courant.com.