Waste Management 2007 Annual Report Download - page 81

Summary of Contractual Obligations
The following table summarizes our contractual obligations as of December 31, 2007 and the anticipated effect
of these obligations on our liquidity in future years (in millions):
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Thereafter Total
Recorded Obligations:
Expected environmental liabilities(a)
Final capping, closure and post-closure . . . $ 106 $ 120 $ 113 $ 73 $ 97 $1,668 $ 2,177
Environmental remediation ............ 44 31 31 18 18 170 312
150 151 144 91 115 1,838 2,489
Debt payments(b), (c) .................. 1,164 697 715 250 576 4,874 8,276
Unrecorded Obligations:(d)
Share repurchases(e) ................. 99 — — — — — 99
Non-cancelable operating lease
obligations. . ..................... 87 69 61 48 41 165 471
Estimated unconditional purchase
obligations(f) ..................... 179 181 164 95 41 307 967
Anticipated liquidity impact as of
December 31, 2007 .............. $1,679 $1,098 $1,084 $484 $773 $7,184 $12,302
(a) Environmental liabilities include final capping, closure, post-closure and environmental remediation costs. The
amounts included here reflect environmental liabilities recorded in our Consolidated Balance Sheet as of
December 31, 2007 without the impact of discounting and inflation. Our recorded environmental liabilities will
increase as we continue to place additional tons within the permitted airspace at our landfills.
(b) Our debt obligations as of December 31, 2007 include $192 million of fixed rate tax-exempt bonds subject to
repricing within the next twelve months, which is prior to their scheduled maturities. If the re-offerings of the
bonds are unsuccessful, then the bonds can be put to us, requiring immediate repayment. We have classified the
anticipated cash flows for these contractual obligations based on the scheduled maturity of the borrowing for
purposes of this disclosure. For additional information regarding the classification of these borrowings in our
Consolidated Balance Sheet as of December 31, 2007, refer to Note 7 to the Consolidated Financial Statements.
(c) Our recorded debt obligations include non-cash adjustments associated with discounts, premiums and fair value
adjustments for interest rate hedging activities. These amounts have been excluded here because they will not
result in an impact to our liquidity in future periods. In addition, $47 million of our future debt payments and
related interest obligations will be made with debt service funds held in trust and included as long-term “Other
assets” within our December 31, 2007 Consolidated Balance Sheet.
(d) Our unrecorded obligations represent operating lease obligations and purchase commitments from which we
expect to realize an economic benefit in future periods. We have also made certain guarantees, as discussed in
Note 10 to the Consolidated Financial Statements, that we do not expect to materially affect our current or
future financial position, results of operations or liquidity.
(e) In November 2007, we entered into a plan under SEC Rule 10b5-1 to effect market purchases of our common
stock. The $99 million disclosed here represents the minimum amount of common stock that could be
repurchased under the terms of the plan. These common stock repurchases were made in accordance with our
Board of Directors approved capital allocation program which authorizes up to $1.4 billion in share repurchases
and dividends in 2008. We repurchased $175 million of our common stock pursuant to the plan, which was
completed on February 7, 2008.
(f) Our unconditional purchase obligations are for various contractual obligations that we generally incur in the
ordinary course of our business. Certain of our obligations are quantity driven. For these contracts, we have
estimated our future obligations based on the current market values of the underlying products or services. See
Note 10 to the Consolidated Financial Statements for discussion of the nature and terms of our unconditional
purchase obligations.
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