Waste collection and disposal volume measures the revenue or operating effect of changes in service activity across collection, transfer, landfill, and related environmental-services operations.
Companies often report volume as a percentage contribution to organic revenue growth rather than as one physical unit.
Volume is the demand leg of organic growth
Pricing and volume can move in opposite directions.
WM reported second-quarter 2026 collection and disposal volume down 1.8%, while collection and disposal yield increased 3.6%.
Republic Services reported second-quarter 2026 volume down 1.9% on related-business revenue while average yield increased 4.0%.
Those combinations show why revenue growth should not be described as purely demand-driven when price is doing most of the work.
Volume can be intentionally negative
A volume decline is not always evidence of lost competitive position.
Waste companies sometimes allow low-margin contracts to roll off or intentionally shed unattractive residential business.
WM said intentional shedding of lower-margin residential business contributed to its second-quarter 2026 collection and disposal volume decline.
Waste Connections has similarly described purposeful non-renewal of lower-margin municipal contracts.
Investors should ask whether lower volume reflects economic weakness, customer losses, deliberate pruning, or unusually strong prior-period activity.
Landfill volume can tell a different story from collection volume
Collection and landfill activity do not necessarily move together.
WM reported that, excluding prior-year wildfire cleanup activity, landfill volumes grew 1.7% in the second quarter of 2026 while overall collection and disposal volume still declined.
Republic also reports yield and volume separately across collection and landfill categories.
That makes the service-line mix important when interpreting consolidated volume.
Acquisitions are a separate growth source
Acquired routes, transfer stations, and landfills can raise reported revenue without improving organic volume at existing operations.
A clean revenue bridge should separate:
- pricing or yield;
- organic volume;
- acquisitions and divestitures;
- fuel and commodity effects; and
- unusual event-driven activity.
Primary-source examples
- WM second-quarter 2026 results
- Republic Services second-quarter 2026 results
- Waste Connections second-quarter 2026 Form 10-Q
Waste collection and disposal volume is most useful as the organic-demand leg of the revenue bridge after pricing, acquisitions, and unusual events are separated.
Part of the Waste & Environmental Services Operating Model
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