For many years the SP Newsprint paper mill in Newberg, Oregon would receive cars full of old railroad ties to fuel their hog burner, along with other wood scrap (in fact it was the best place around here to dispose of scrap wood or tree debris, they'd accept it for free).

Now the paper mill is shut down and gone, local waste haulers charge to take the wood debris and chip it up for landscaping use, and railroad ties are now hazardous waste.