Waste Management of Orange County driver Jose "Paco" Gonzalez was one of two Waste Management employees selected company-wide to appear in the new television commercials.

ORANGE/SAN DIEGO COUNTIES, Sept. 12, 2006 - You won’t see any special effects or stunt doubles in Waste Management’s new television advertisements that started airing on TV Sept. 4 - who needs them when you have recognizable equipment and talented employees ready to take the starring role?

Employees at Waste Management are vital components of the “everyday collection” and “environmental protection” tenets that guide the company’s business. In fact, drivers and their signature green trucks are perhaps the most visible aspects of the company for the millions of customers around North America. That’s why both are starring as branding symbols for the company in its new ad campaign.

Waste Management of Orange County driver Jose “Paco” Gonzalez and Waste Management of Oregon operations manager Kevin Buse are playing featured roles in the company’s television ads, which will air nationally Sept. 4 through the end of the year. Building on the success of the first Think Green campaign that launched in 2005, Waste Management is not only rolling out new commercials with information about the company’s conservation and sustainability efforts, but it is also branding 20,000 vehicles from its truck fleet with a variety of environmental factoids featured in the commercials.

“When people see the green WM truck on their block, they have come to expect reliable, professional service,” said David Aardsma, senior VP of sales and marketing. “But what people may not know is all of the projects and efforts the company is engaged in to help our environment. We hope these ads, featuring real WM employees, real WM equipment and real WM accomplishments will educate them about our environmental activities.”

On a local level, Waste Management is also committed to sound environmental practices. The company’s Southern California operations has the heaviest concentration of natural gas trucks within all of Waste Management’s operations in North America - and the company as a whole also has the distinction of operating one of the largest fleets of low emission heavy-duty natural gas trucks in the country. Waste Management has the largest fleet of 100 percent natural gas trucks in the solid waste industry. During the summer of 2005, Waste Management’s operations in Orange and San Diego Counties beat the California Air Resources Board (ARB) early deadline for retrofitting or retiring diesel trucks in order to reduce particulate emissions.

Nationally, the company recycles enough paper to save more than 41 million trees, helps power more than one million homes and provides more than 17,000 acres of wildlife habitat on its landfills.

Employees in the Spotlight

The new television commercials feature employees who embody two key components in the company’s daily operations - safety and environmentalism.

Paco Gonzalez, a roll-off driver based in Santa Ana, Calif. (who resides in Westminster), has been with the company for 32 years - achieving this tenure accident- and injury-free. Every day, he focuses on safely working his route as well as making sure his customers are more than satisfied with his service.

“You have to be focused and pay attention to what is ahead,” he said. “I always check my mirrors and see what is behind me and especially keep my distance from other cars and trucks.

"Doing the commercial was something new and interesting -- it was a good experience and I was very happy to do it. The people I worked with -- from WM and from Hollywood -- were very nice."

Kevin Buse, operations manager from St. Helens, Ore., joined WM six years ago specifically because of the company’s role in environmental stewardship. “I was working for another company at the time, but liked the idea of moving to a company that makes a positive impact,” Buse said.

The television commercials were shot on location at Waste Management’s Hillsboro Landfill and the surrounding Wildlife Habitat Council-certified wildlife acreage in Oregon, as well as regions serviced by the company in Seattle, Wash. The ads are airing among programming including sporting events such as college football, Major League Baseball, the PGA Tour Golf, NCAA basketball and NASCAR, as well as with network and cable news shows, and on the History Channel and National Geographic Channel.

The ads can also be viewed on Waste Management’s Web site at www.wm.com/wm/thinkgreen.

Waste Management, based in Houston, Texas, is the leading provider of comprehensive waste management services in North America. Our subsidiaries provide collection, transfer, recycling and resource recovery and disposal services. We are also a leading developer, operator and owner of waste-to-energy and landfill gas-to-energy facilities in the United States. Our customers include residential, commercial, industrial and municipal customers throughout North America.