So far, Wiscasset, Alna and Westport Island haven't taken a hit on the Wiscasset Transfer Station's cost to get rid of the three towns’ trash.

That's largely because money saved elsewhere at the station has helped offset hikes in Penobscot Energy Recovery Company's fees to take in the trash, the station’s superintendent, Ron Lear, said.

Wiscasset has bought the station some new equipment in recent years: A new truck is saving on fuel, and a packer for recycling cuts the fuel and maintenance costs on a tractor; but in the coming years, as the Orrington plant nears its 2018 closure, the fees the waste-to-energy facility charges towns will keep climbing, Lear said.

Those other savings won't be able to keep buffering the towns' tabs from PERC's hiking fees, Lear said.

The station's recycling rate has improved in recent years: The 307 tons recycled in 2013 was 57 tons more than in 2010. And trash totals are down, from 1,996 tons in 2010 to 1,731 tons in 2013.

Lear said users can help control the station’s costs at PERC, by continuing to increase their recycling and decrease their trash. Plans for the addition of a bin for food scraps that will be composted should also help, he said.

“The more recycling we do and the more composting we do is going to save us on tonnage that goes to PERC, and that’s going to save us money, big-time,” Lear said.

It is not yet known what the Wiscasset station and others will be doing with their trash post-2018, or how much that will cost them. Planning now under way centers on solutions that would be environmentally sound and be at least as affordable as PERC, said Greg Lounder, executive director of Municipal Review Committee Inc. The nonprofit is working on those plans on towns’ behalf.