Recycling

Thursday, March 2011:00am, Burnsville City Hall

Dakota Valley RecyclingLeigh Behrens & Andrea Uhl

Recycling Misconceptions:

Doesn’t save natural resources

We already recycle all we can

Recycling is too inconvenient

Recyclables get thrown in the landfill anyway

Single-sort recycling leads to useless, contaminated recyclables

Recyclables aren’t worth much if anything

Causes more pollution than it prevents

Costs too much/should pay for itself

All gets shipped somewhere far away

One person can’t make a difference in recycling

Myth 1: Recycling Doesn’t Save Natural Resources Life-cycle analysis: examines the entire

chain of events from manufacture to disposal

For every item recycled, that’s one less item that needs to be produced from virgin material

Recycling 1 ton of steel saves 2,500 pounds of ore, 1,400 pounds of coal and 120 pounds of limestone

Source: Steel Recycling Institute

Every ton of newsprint or mixed paper recycled saves the equivalent of cutting down 17 trees to make paper

Source: National Recycling Coalition

The energy conserved by recycling exceeds the electricity generated by waste-to-energy facilities

Minnesota’s Waste Management Hierarchy

Myth #2: We already recycle as much as we can In 2013, MPCA took samples of garbage

from 6 landfills, including: Pine Bend Landfill, Inver Grove Heights

Findings: about 40% of garbage could have been recycled

Compostable material (such as food) is over 25% of our trash

Similar to 2000 (still lots of work to do)

Myth #3: Recycling is too inconvenient

http://youtu.be/HLJYQaoLgag?t=28s

Convenience of Recycling Recycling: more popular than voting!

Voting: 83.9% Recycling: 91%

Source: Eagan Patch, Eagan 2012 Residential Survey

All Burnsville residents have access to recycling as per City ordinance 433 (7-7-4, 12-2-1991)

Dakota County Recycling Center (The Recycling Zone) in Eagan acts as a drop-off site for residents

Single sort recycling (where all recyclables go into one bin) means less sorting: easier than ever!

More materials recyclable—can be confusing Solution: go online to

www.DakotaValleyRecycling.org/curbside to see a poster of everything your hauler accepts

Myth 4: Recyclables just get thrown away State Statute 115A.95: Haulers are not

allowed to take materials that were collected as recycling to landfills or incinerators for disposal; nor are those places legally allowed to accept them

Haulers bring recyclables to a MRF (materials recovery facility) to be sorted

Twin Cities MRFs Allied Waste (Republic) - Inver Grove Heights Waste Management – Northeast Minneapolis Dem-Con – Shakopee

Recyclables go through a series of conveyors, screens, magnets and manual sorting

Let’s see how it works

At the end of the process, baled material is sold for reprocessing

Glass is sold for secondary sorting to be separated by color

Myth #5: Single-sort leads to contamination of recyclables “Commingled” or “Single-Sort” recycling

means putting all your recyclables in one receptacle How can bits of glass be separated the

other recyclables? Do paper envelopes get mixed in with

plastic bottles? How do things of similar shapes, like cans

and bottles, get separated?

Sorting at the MRF Sorting process for commingled

recyclables: http://youtu.be/5YaTpL8nl7c?t=1m19s Order of separation:

Cardboard (cardboard screen) “fines” (fines screen) Paper from containers (double-deck paper

screen and banana screen) Steel from containers (magnet) Aluminum from containers (Eddy current) Plastics left over Glass from “fines”

After the MRF: Glass sorting Glass must be sorted by color

Brown (Amber) Green Clear

New technology: optical sorting! Developed for sorting agricultural

products

After the MRF: Optical Sorting, Technology in Action ! http://youtu.be/V54iBP2CU6c?t=2m14s

After the MRF: Plastics Sorting How do caps, lids and labels get

removed? If all colors are mixed together, why

isn’t all recycled plastic an ugly gray color?

After the MRF: Plastics Sorting How do caps, lids and labels get

removed? Shredded into “flake” Fed into a giant water bath http://youtu.be/zyF9MxlcItw?t=1m (to 1:39)

PET (#1 plastic, e.g. pop bottles) sinks Bottle caps (#5), labels, contaminant

float Bath 1: skim off bottle caps Bath 2: skim off labels

Plastics Sorting If all colors are mixed

together, why isn’t all recycled plastic an ugly gray color?

Answer: optical sorting!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAOg9AaxGWI

Sort as feedstock for pellet-ization

Product: Companies can manufacture plastic

pellets into millions of colors to, in turn, be manufactured into “new” plastic bottles

Myth 6: Recyclables aren’t worth anything Recycling is a business: investment Market values vary (for both virgin and

recycled materials)

Recyclables Worth Something Aluminum: a pop can returns to the grocery

store shelf as a “new” can in as few as 60 days

Steel: scrap is the largest source of raw material in the steel industry because it is so economically advantageous over virgin

Glass: recycled glass extends the life of glass furnaces. Energy costs drop by 0.5% for every 1% of recycled glass used

Paper: more than 80% of US paper manufacturers use recycled fiber

Sources: Aluminum Association, Steel Recycling Institute, Glass Packaging Institute

Myth 7: Recycling causes more pollution than it prevents A national recycling rate of 30% reduces

greenhouse gas emissions equal to taking 25 million cars off the road

Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

Throwing away an aluminum can wastes as much energy as pouring out 6 ounces of gasoline

Making a can from recycled aluminum takes 95% less energy than making a can from virgin ore

Source: Keep America Beautiful

In the U.S., processing minerals creates 1.5 million tons of air and water pollution each year

Recycling can significantly reduce these emissions

Source: World Watch Institute

Myth 8: Recycling costs too much/should pay for itself

MN State Statute 297H: Solid Waste Management tax

MN State Statute 400.08: financial incentive to recycle (volume-based rates)

Collection cost + disposal cost + waste tax = Garbage service costCollection cost – sale of recyclables =

Recycling service cost

Households and businesses can save money by reducing trash volume

Financial, economic and environmental benefits

37,000 jobs in MN directly/indirectly supported by recycling industry

Recycling creates 4 jobs for every 1 job in waste disposal and management industries

In 2010, 2.5 million tons of recyclables collected: est. worth $690 million

Not recycling costs money: 1.2 million tons of recyclables (worth est. $285 million) were thrown into landfills, which cost MN $200 million

NRC Recycling Economic Information Study

Recycling paying for itself Thousands of US companies save money

by having voluntary recycling programs Automotive companies: toward zero waste

GM: 92%, Toyota: 96%, Honda: 10 plants @ 100%

ARROW program: businesses in Burnsville, Eagan and Apple Valley that recycle http://

www.dakotavalleyrecycling.org/current-members

Myth 9: Your recyclables are all shipped out of state/country Many factories in MN use recycled

materials Anchor Glass: Shakopee, MN RockTenn (Paper): St. Paul, MN Liberty Paper: Becker, MN Bedford Technologies (HDPE):

Worthington, MN Choice Plastics: Mound, MN Many more

Recycled Glass in MN Anchor Glass (Shakopee)

Video (3:58)

Source: Recycling Association of Minnesota, KARE11

Recycled Plastic in MN Bedford Technologies (Worthington):

HDPE 5,000 tons of #2 plastic per year turned

into plastic lumber products Ladtech Systems: (Lino Lakes): HDPE

1,000 tons of #2 plastic per year to make sewer adjustment rings for manholes

Master Mark (Albany, Paynesville): HDPE Over 500,000 tons of #2 plastic per year

for lawn, garden and building supplies

Source: Recycling Association of Minnesota

Recycled Plastic in MN Choice Plastics (Mound): multiple

types of plastics Clean pellets for manufacturing

Gopher Resource (Eagan): Polypropylene (car battery cases) Turned into:

Battery cases/covers Shovels Floor mats Car Components

Source: Recycling Association of Minnesota

Recycled Metal in MN Alter Corp. (Anoka, Hayfield, Marshall,

Mankato, St. Paul): Steel and aluminum Processor and broker of multiple types of

material Kirschbaum & Krupp (Minneapolis):

Steel & non-ferrous scrap metal

Source: Recycling Association of Minnesota, MPCA

Recycled Paper in MN RockTenn (St. Paul): Paper

100 tons per day 50% of the paper recycled in MN

Liberty Paper (Becker): Cardboard 200,000 tons of materials diverted from

the landfill each year Turned into paper

International Paper (Roseville): Paper 21 facilities in N. America 10% of all paper recovered in the US goes

to an Int’l Paper facility

Source: Recycling Association of Minnesota

Myth 10: One person cannot make a difference The average American generates 4.38

pounds of waste per day 34.5 % of that is composted 61,061 people live in Burnsville, creating

roughly 267,477 pounds (133 tons) of waste per year

Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

If every person in Burnsville threw away just one plastic bottle each day, that would add up to 22.3 million bottles in the landfill every year

There are 7 billion people in the world – what if they all decided not to recycle?

“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.” – Edmund Burke

Thank YouQuestions?

One shipping container holds about 40,000 lbs of stuff

Source: MPCA Speaker Series: Adam Minter

Plastics, the “new” packaging http://youtu.be/s5p6Nk3SzcU?t=14s