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Recycling has become an accepted practice that supports and enhances solid waste management.

By Pamela Gratton

Recycling is a versatile word that has finally been accepted into our lexicon; that is, the concept of recycling has been embraced in a variety of ways and incorporated into our daily lives. This is good news for solid waste managers in the United States since it helps to legitimize recycling as a fundamental tool for addressing the nation’s wastestream. In other words, recycling can finally get some respect. Recycling has become an accepted practice that supports and enhances solid waste management. The relationship between recycling and disposal ensures that disposal efforts are directed towards materials that need to be properly disposed of while maximizing the environmental benefits derived from recycling. This acknowledgement of the legitimacy of recycling has been a long-fought battle that is now producing benefits that help support the practice when barriers to implementation arise.

This article was written with the future of recycling in mind over a 20-year horizon. An exploration of the dynamics of recycling is presented with an eye toward the challenges that we will face in the future as more complicated wastestreams arise and the arrangements of our communities change. These changes, which are bound to occur, will shape how recyclables are collected, transported, and managed in relationship to the communities where the practice is intended to serve.

Setting the Stage
One of the most obvious impacts of recycling has been the recent national emphasis on energy conservation. Price fluctuations in fossil fuel markets due to political instability have had a dramatic effect on how energy production from recyclables is perceived. Many solid waste management technologies that had been proposed in earlier decades as the solution to waste management issues have been resurrected to determine potential efficiencies in the new world order of energy issues.

Organic residuals are the waste products most often evaluated for energy production. But organic residuals have been used for centuries to augment and fertilize soils for crop production. Soil scientists are well acquainted with the benefits of using organic materials and animal byproducts for supporting and improving soil health. Scientific techniques used to make organic wastes more amenable to supporting soil health have been refined over time. Today, professional composters and animal waste managers are using advanced technologies that focus on making quality soil conditioners and fertilizers demonstrated to improve soil health.

Soil-improvement products made from organic residuals, whether from plant or animal sources, have been accepted in the marketplace, as proven through strong sales histories. United States Environmental Protection Agency statistics estimate that in 2006, over 77 million tons of organic wastes (woodwaste, foodwaste, and yardwaste) were generated (Municipal Solid Waste Generation, Recycling and Disposal in the United States, Facts and Figures for 2006; United States Environmental Protection Agency, Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response. EPA-530-F007-03, November 2007). This figure does not include agricultural wastes or biosolids from wastewater treatment plants. This information is provided to demonstrate the potential strength of the organic residuals market in the United States. Organic residuals are the feedstocks that create soil enhancement products from waste sources. These products are now relied upon to support the burgeoning production of organic foods since the use of inorganic chemical fertilizers on food crops prevents them from being labeled as organic.

But now that the nation faces critical energy management issues, there is renewed vigor in evaluating the use of organic residuals for energy production rather than as soil amendments. The economics of advanced technologies for managing organic residuals, such as anaerobic digestion for methane production, are rapidly changing to point where they actually make financial sense. Any organics management technology that utilizes an enclosed system where air emissions are reduced and minimized will be an enormous benefit, especially with respect to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions.

Enclosed systems and in-vessel technologies for energy production from organic residuals will support environmental improvement in two ways: by reducing disposed wastes and by preventing the release of GHGs. Additionally, enclosed organics management systems will be necessary for odor control to prevent adverse community impacts. Odor can be the number-one issue related to negative perceptions associated with processing organic residuals for beneficial use, even if it is for energy production.

Equal and Opposite Reaction
Recycling takes on new meaning in the context of the new wastes that have been introduced into municipal waste systems in this decade. The extraordinary advancements in electronic technologies have created waste streams that were not in existence during the previous decade. Every week there seems to be a new electronic gadget that becomes popularized only to find its way out of vogue (and into the wastestream) within a very short time span. Communities have been faced with challenges in finding the best method for managing the large volume of obsolete electronics that come into their waste management systems.

Additionally, when a pollutant is identified in a particular piece of electronic equipment, there may be an effort to adapt the product in order to remove the particular pollutant. This is the concept of Design for the Environment, a practice where products are to be designed with as few potentially polluting compounds as possible. This concept has been formalized by the European Union (EU) in several of its directives.

“In order to prevent the generation of hazardous waste, Directive 2002/95/EC requires the substitution of various heavy metals (lead, mercury, cadmium, and hexavalent chromium) and brominated flame retardants (polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) or polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE) in new electrical and electronic equipment put on the market from 1 July 2006.” (Directive 2002/95/EC on the Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment [RoHS] and Directive 2002/96/EC on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment. European Commission; Directorate—General, Environment. February 13, 2003.)

This practice has not been fully embraced by American manufacturers, but they know that if they want to sell products in Europe, compliance with this directive will be required.

Will the reduction in the use of potentially hazardous components in the manufacture of electronic products assist in recycling and recovery efforts? Certainly, the potential for reducing the hazards of the wastestream will be an extreme benefit. But for every action, the equal and opposite reaction can occur resulting in the unintentional introduction of yet another pollutant.

A primary example of the “equal and opposite reaction” is the recent emphasis on the use of compact fluorescent lamps to reduce energy consumption. Now, solid waste managers are faced with the need to provide lamp recovery services to remove mercury-containing bulbs from the wastestream to prevent emitting this proven toxic metal into the environment. Hope for the future exists though in the form of light-emitting diodes (LEDs), which in the very near future may replace lighting fixtures currently in use, making fluorescent lamps obsolete.

For example, almost all of the electronic equipment that is desirable today would be even more desirable if it had no cord to a power supply. Powerful batteries are under development where they will be used to power automobiles, and eventually, heavy equipment and trucks. This sounds like a big challenge with respect to finding suitable avenues to properly recycle large batteries. This is another example of the unidentified territory that solid waste managers find themselves in when challenged with finding ways to recycle items that haven’t yet been created.

Complicated Collection
Single-stream collection of recyclables has been touted as the salvation of recycling in the United States due to cost savings with the reduced number of truck trips and fuel usage. Many municipalities have embraced this collection technique in their curbside collection programs. Recently, some very severe complications associated with single-stream collection programs have been identified that significantly degrade the quality of recycled paper. The impact of single-stream collection on the quality of recycled paper is not only reflected in the pricing for recycled paper, but also in its impact on equipment used in all phases of recycling from transportation to processing. These are issues that have not been fully identified or vetted.

In single-stream collection, recycling setouts all go into one container. But this allows broken glass to mix with paper set out in the same container. So when the mixed recyclables are collected in the same container, especially in rear-end packers with hydraulic equipment, the effect is to grind the glass into the paper. This severely reduces the quality of the paper and the ability of single-stream processing technology to adequately remove the glass. There are reports of increased maintenance issues on truck interiors and hydraulic equipment due to the daily abrasion occurring in a truck used to collect recycling for single-stream processing.

This has been borne out by the fact that numerous paper mills have invested in their own material recovery facilities (MRFs) to clean up recycled paper collected and processed in a single-stream program. Glass is the nemesis of paper processors that use recycled paper as their feedstock. It clogs filters and rips screens that papermakers rely upon to achieve their production goals.

Reports are also surfacing about the impact of the glass and other abrasives on the single-stream processing equipment on the MRFs themselves. Due to the inability of some single-stream processing facilities to adequately remove the glass and achieve the paper manufacturer’s quality standards, baler maintenance issues are becoming more prevalent. Residual abrasives retained in paper collected and processed using single-stream technologies are being crushed again when the recycled paper is baled for shipment. This abrasion of the interior of balers can result in the baler needing to be repaired once every six months. This accelerates maintenance costs adding to processing costs.

The impact of paper shredding is also starting to be identified as an issue with regard to recycled paper quality. Papermaking relies on utilizing the “long paper fiber” portion of the paper pulp. The long paper fiber allows for better interlocking of individual paper fibers in paper sheets resulting in a stronger product with the qualities desired by the end user. Short paper fiber is the portion of paper pulp that is wasted in the papermaking process and ends up going through the papermaker’s wastewater treatment system only to become a waste product for the manufacturer. So when paper is shredded, the long paper fibers can be further degraded. Additionally, it is much more difficult to identify contaminants in shredded paper. This can have a critical impact on the papermaking process.

Single-stream collection has also resulted in a significant consolidation in the recyclables processing market. Often, no other processing options exist in a particular geographic area since competition has been reduced or eliminated through consolidation. While single-stream processors should be applauded for providing needed processing capacity in some areas of the United States, there needs to be a realization that the processing of recyclables collected using the single-stream technique must achieve a higher level of quality in order for single-stream collection and processing to be a sustainable practice.

A review of average paper prices for three grades of recycled paper (ONP, mixed, and cardboard) from 2001 through 2007 reveals that prices have steadily risen during the time frame (Transacted Paper Stock Prices—Low Grades, Southeast. Official Board Markets, 2001–2007). In 2001, cardboard was trading at about $35 to $40 per ton; in 2007, the price nearly tripled. This pricing is a dream for the recycler who knows that this may be another anomaly in pricing schemes for paper that may not be sustainable. Prudent paper recyclers will look back to poorer market conditions for a reality check and take this into account when making long-term recycling decisions. The quality of recycled paper may have the biggest impact on paper markets. If poor quality paper is being produced, then the papermaking industry will be very negatively impacted. And if paper recycling goes away, recycling as a whole may disappear.

A New Construction Tool
It is good to be green these days, especially if you are in the construction business. With “green building” efforts appearing in many areas of the United States, the need to find better ways of using or recycling construction and demolition debris (CDD) is readily apparent. The disposal of CDD in the US is conducted under controlled conditions, but subject to reduced environmental controls when compared to those applied to municipal solid waste disposal.

As is typically the case, states with legislation requiring CDD recycling or diversion are taking the lead in demonstrating the suitability of recycling these materials. Increasing energy costs are reflected in the prices of building materials hopefully resulting in more judicious use of the building materials in the first place.

Reducing the amount of materials used is the first step in preserving building supplies and resources.

The future of CDD recycling relies on governments willing to put legislation in place to require green building practices along with the ancillary idea of requiring recycling or diversion of these materials rather than disposal. Research needs to accompany increasing CDD recovery efforts to create significant markets for these materials. Whoever develops the panacea for recycling wallboard from demolition projects will surely reap the benefit because so much of it is used throughout the country. About 15 million tons of wallboard is used annually in the United States with about 12% or 1.8 million tons discarded (Wallboard Recycling Statistics. California Integrated Waste Management Board. Web site posting, November 2007). Costs associated with recovery and recycling of CDD materials need to be competitive with disposal prices. This is difficult when considering that the environmental controls applied to CDD waste management practices are less than those applied to municipal solid waste.

The Responsibility of Producers and Purchasers
The concept of producer responsibility and its role in recycling is an important recent phenomenon. Producer responsibility for the purpose of environmental stewardship is goal that, if embraced by businesses, will be a powerful tool in reducing the pollution potential of wastes, while improving the opportunities for recycling.

Canadian authorities have recognized the benefits of implementing producer responsibility programs and have developed several programs demonstrating the pollution prevention aspects of the approach.

Product stewardship initiatives are effective in enhancing recycling by: 1) not using potentially toxic materials in the manufacture of a product, and 2) requiring the manufacturer to create a system to manage the material when it becomes obsolete. It may be counterintuitive to believe that product manufacturers are the best entities to achieve the highest levels of recycling for their materials since recycling is not their core business.

But when you consider that the manufacturer has detailed knowledge of each component included in the products, who better to find creative ways to reuse and recycle product components?

Opportunities for strong public/private partnerships arise when manufacturers take on responsibility for end-of-life management of products. Public entities are very receptive to the idea of sharing the responsibility where they can provide outreach and logistical support for collecting the product for recycling, while the manufacturer creates and develops end markets for non-traditional recyclables. With metal prices being very strong and the demand for raw materials ever increasing, the need for sophisticated recycling techniques that maximize the recovery of metals will be an essential aspect of the future of recycling.

The purchaser of products also plays a role in recycling. While it might be heresy to state it, reducing our consumption of products is an integral part of reducing the need to recycle. This is a behavior change that may not be palatable to many people but it is time to start modifying habits to control the amount of the world’s resources that are consumed.

Strong Messages Can Be Strong Medicine
Recycling is a strong message that requires continual reinforcement, but the message can have a preachy tone when presented constantly. Organizations have been working for years for the ultimate message that will resonate with the public. Recent efforts to rebrand recycling are still in the preliminary stages of implementation.

Recyclers should take a look at normalizing and leveling the materials recycled on a national basis.

Opportunities to make residential recycling the same throughout the nation would go a very long way in making recycling easy to understand.

It is not so much that recycling is hard to do, but understanding exactly what to recycle that can make it difficult. If recycling of the most desirable materials is emphasized, then quality can be maintained and improved to support markets over the long term. Recycling markets can only improve when the highest-quality materials are delivered in a reliable and uninterrupted fashion.

Coordinated messages about recycling delivered on a regular and perhaps monotonous basis will be a strong medicine that will help to cure some of the low-quality issues associated with recycling inappropriate materials. It is only when recyclers get tired of hearing their own messages that they will know their efforts have truly been
successful.

Writer Pamela F. Gratton is the recycling manager for Fairfax County, Virginia.

MSW - Elements 2009