Start to Finish

Joe Clayton, director of sales at Synergy Recycling LLC, summarizes the electronics recycling company’s operations this way: “We process approximately 25,000 tons per year and we strive to recycle all of the incoming materials. No electronics are landfilled.”

Clayton credits the financial backing and philosophy of the company’s co-owners with having made that goal achievable. “We chose this path because of the backgrounds of our owners, some of whom came out of the traditional scrap recycling industry,” he comments.

Within the past year, the financial backing has played a key role. “We have installed state-of-the-art technology that allows shredding and mechanical commodity grade sorting with one pass,” Clayton says of Synergy’s major new investment in its Madison, N.C., plant.
 

READY TO SERVE
When Synergy Recycling was created in 2000, much of its focus was on the repair, refurbishment and recycling of telecommunications equipment, says Clayton, since one of the company’s original founders was part of that industry.

Not long after Clayton joined the company in 2003, Synergy broadened its focus to welcome more computers and peripherals, notes Clayton. He says the company initially handled only a modest amount of material and that generation of e-scrap was more modest then.

The material stream has subsequently broadened to include end-of-life consumer electronics, office equipment and small appliances. “We recycle pretty much anything with a cord or a rechargeable battery: hair dryers, coffee makers, toaster ovens, cordless drills—anything someone might use in their office, house or kitchen,” says Clayton.

Commercial and residential customers can each have concerns about secure destruction, notes Clayton. In the case of computers, information (hard drive) destruction is the key service sought. Some manufacturers and retailers, on the other hand, are more concerned about having returned and overstocked merchandise destroyed rather than having it end up back on the market.

“All our clients require this,” Clayton says of secure data destruction assurances. “I am glad that the clients have caught up to this requirement, as we have been leading the way in the Southeast on this effort. We have always provided secure destruction of data since our inception in 2000.”

The risks of lax data security protection are very real, says Clayton. “Some clients still do not fully recognize that a used computer may contain sensitive personal data that could be used to drain bank accounts, obtain credit cards or create other mischief,” he comments. “E-mail lists left on computers might be sold to the highest bidder, perhaps for scams. Proper recycling and data destruction is one very important key to reducing the incidence of these types of crimes that target our citizens.”

How material is handled when it reaches Synergy’s facility in Madison depends first on customer instructions and then on the potential component or tested unit resale value.

At its Madison, N.C., plant, Synergy Recycling accepts a wide variety of end-of-life electronic items. The company reduces them to shredded pieces that can then be mechanically separated and sorted into marketable secondary commodities. “We still harvest parts from computers,” says Clayton, “and we still wipe some hard drives and remarket them But by volume only about 1 percent does not go into the shredder.” Clayton says this figure does not include cathode ray tube (CRT) monitors, which are still hand disassembled for safe and environmentally sound handling.

Synergy’s combination of services and its reliability in providing those services have helped it grow consistently in the past decade, says Clayton. “We started small and have grown to 100 employees in 11 years of operation,” he comments.
 

THOROUGH AUTOMATION
The degree of automation at Synergy was, to some extent, kept at a low level for the company’s first several years as it concentrated on equipment testing, component harvesting, secure hard drive destruction or erasure and disassembly—including safe disassembly of CRT monitors.

Synergy’s growth and evolution can be compared in some ways with how a scrap yard grows before it is ready to install its own auto shredding plant. Clayton makes that comparison himself, in part because of the scrap background of some of the company’s owners and also because of the way Synergy approached its own shredder installation.

“We chose this path because of the backgrounds of our owners, some of whom came out of the traditional scrap recycling industry, and because we have installed state-of-the-art technology that allows shredding and mechanical commodity grade sorting with one pass,” says Clayton.

He credits key vendors SGM Magnetics Corp., Sarasota, Fla., and MTD Americas Ltd., Atlanta, for their roles in designing and diligently testing the system Synergy now has in place. “Some of Synergy’s co-owners have a close relationship with SGM and MTD on other ventures,” notes Clayton. “It was natural that when MTD and SGM decided they wanted to shrink the throughput of what they do at auto shredding plants and apply that model to an electronics shredder that they chose us as sort of their laboratory. It has been a very good thing for us—they have applied their auto shredder model while also increasing the quality of the end products.”

Of the mixed metals produced by the process, Clayton says, “Our material is incredibly clean. We are lucky that some of our owning partners come out of the scrap industry, so we know the value of metal and we market through traditional channels. We almost act as a large scrap yard and sell material ready for the furnace in many instances. Our zorba (mixed nonferrous metal) is incredibly clean, and we earn repeat business. We don’t sell to a customer one time and then have to look for another.”

According to Clayton, MTD did some of its trial-and-error “tinkering” at a test facility in Atlanta as well as by conducting tests at Synergy’s Madison plant as it brought equipment online. “SMG has top-of-the-line magnetic separation equipment, and MTD makes incredibly advanced optics,” says Clayton. “These are very strong partners. The proprietary equipment they have provided to Synergy is unmatched at any other site in U.S. Other recyclers may have somewhat similar equipment, but the performance of our equipment is the leading technology in our field. What we provide is the material flow and the knowledge base. It is a beautiful fit.”

Synergy’s new processing line includes two shredders, a series of magnets to separate steel, a nonferrous processing line and another set of processing equipment specifically handling plastic. The new system is capable of handling up to 30 tons of electronic scrap per hour and is capable of shredding hard drives, copiers, printers, computers and the other types of equipment accepted by Synergy. According to Clayton, the system allows Synergy to recycle (or, in some cases, re-use) approximately 99 percent of its incoming materials stream.

The system is meeting Synergy’s expectations, says Clayton. “We generate clean, market-ready commodities that replace virgin materials as feedstock,” he comments. “We also have injection-molding equipment to make products from the engineered plastics with which we plan to begin production in late summer to early fall of this year.”
 

LOTS OF OPTIONS
Clayton says Synergy’s recent investments in capital equipment will help ensure it continues to provide the comprehensive services requested by its corporate customer base.

“We serve all segments, but increasingly we are serving business clients and other recyclers,” he comments. “Our advanced shredding and separation technology gives clients a real sense of comfort that their data has been completely destroyed. The same technology gives us the opportunity to help other electronics recyclers create greater value from the end-of-life equipment they receive from their clients,” he adds.

In addition to creating marketable secondary commodities and to destroy- ing data, the shredding system also en- sures thorough product destruction when that service is requested, such as in the case of returned products.

Synergy also has sought process-control and marketing advantages through certification. (See the sidebar “Certified Success,” on page 45.)

Investing in a high-volume processing system and obtaining certifications positions Synergy to remain competitive in what Clayton sees as a consolidating market.

“Until recently the electronics recycling industry has been characterized by startup, entrepreneurial companies and very low barriers to entry,” Clayton observes. “People could get started with a box truck and a warehouse. That is changing rapidly, though, and we expect to see consolidation and greater sophistication among the largest electronics recyclers.”

Not only does Synergy hope to compete on the basis of its one large plant, but the company’s owners are planning to expand geographically by setting up similar shredding operations in other market regions.

“We plan to roll out our technology across the United States in the next three-to-five years to include from four to six locations,” says Clayton. “Our process can handle up to 30 tons per hour, so our geographic footprint need not have many locations to provide the sophisticated destruction and separation services our clients need.”

The new investments in automation create one path to future growth, but Clayton says there are reasons beyond machinery that have helped Synergy Recycling get to where it is.

“Synergy has a simple and straightforward philosophy: give exceptional service for a fair price and process all materials with a concern for their potential environmental and economic impacts,” states Clayton.

“Transparency with our clients is a key factor, and going the extra mile for them greatly enhances our relationships,” he continues. “We use word of mouth from existing clients as an additional sales force. The value of a peer suggesting Synergy is an incredibly powerful sales pitch. In almost any business, customer referrals are a key to growth in a highly competitive market.”

Clayton is optimistic that Synergy’s people and its processing techniques have positioned the company to thrive among large and small competitors in any business environment or market conditions.

“We believe we are doing things properly,” he states. “We’ll continue to focus on offering high-quality services to our clients while properly handling the environmental impacts and making sure we have a healthy workplace for our employees.”