A pioneer in recycling since the early 1980s, Machinex has evolved with its customers and the industry. By understanding their needs, the company has developed innovative technologies to address challenges while advancing recycling performance. Machinex takes pride in maintaining loyal partnerships, with some lasting for over 35 years.
While Machinex has grown to deliver some of the world’s largest and most advanced material recovery facilities (MRFs), its heart also remains loyal to serving smaller-scale businesses in need of sorting solutions. Whether fostering new relationships or maintaining long-standing ones, Machinex’s purpose remains the same: to provide the waste and recycling industry and its customers with the right sorting solutions.
This guiding purpose has shaped the decisions of its owner and president, Pierre Paré, throughout his 41-year career at the company. It is also why Machinex has developed and manufactured in-house over 25 proprietary sorting equipment and designed systems to serve nine different markets within the waste & recycling industry, all while upholding the highest standards of quality.
A proven vision
This year, Machinex was named Recycling Equipment Innovator of the Year by the National Waste and Recycling Association (NWRA) in recognition of its installation of its Next-Generation MRF at the Sherbourne Resource Park in Coventry, England. This award, beyond commending the innovative solution that enhances efficiency in recycling operations, highlights Machinex’s leadership and forward-thinking approach to the industry.
Quebec-based Machinex earned the NWRA distinction by providing a sorting system featuring 19 SamurAI® sorting robots, 13 MACH Hyspec® optical units, and multiple MACH Intell® platforms facility-wide. This MRF elevates recycling automation by processing 52 tons per hour of single-stream recycling, reaching up to 99 percent purity rates with only 5 manual sorters.
The company is a trusted partner in MRF optimization, providing its unique proprietary technologies globally for large and small single-stream plants, as well as those processing construction and demolition materials and organics, to name a few.
Success breeds loyalty
In August, Rumpke Waste & Recycling officially opened the largest residential and commercial single-stream MRF in North America, a 226,000-square-foot facility in Columbus, Ohio, outfitted with a sorting system custom-designed by Machinex. The facility, capable of processing 60 tons per hour, features 19 MACH Hyspec® optical sorters, some of which are combined with MACH Vision™ artificial intelligence (AI) technology and four MACH ballistic separators. Through the use of trommels as front-end solution, the MRF has been able to size material before the presort line, allowing it to cut down on manual sorters.
When discussing the innovation integrated into the MRF, Rumpke Senior Vice President of Recycling and Sustainability Jeff Snyder says, “I have an open mind when it comes to recycling and trying new things. Sometimes things work and sometimes not, but if you have it to the point where you believe in it, and you trust in a company like Machinex that can make it happen, then you just go for it. I think that’s so important. We started up on time, we’re performing incredibly well, and we’re excited about what we have going on.”
For Snyder, the choice to partner with Machinex was driven by the company’s ability to integrate its equipment into a greenfield facility.
“From a teamwork side, from a people side, Machinex really brings something special to the table that I believe the industry doesn’t have,” Snyder adds. “It is working with me as a customer, providing what I need, being open and flexible to what I need in our facility.”
Navigating the needs of business sizes from across the spectrum, Machinex tailors its approach from serving one of the nation’s largest privately owned residential and commercial waste and recycling firms to a well-established hauling and disposal company entering the recycling sphere with its first MRF.
“From a teamwork side, from a people side, Machinex really brings something special to the table that I believe the industry doesn’t have. It is working with me as a customer, providing what I need, being open and flexible to what I need in our facility.”
Adapting to the customer
In September, waste management company Central Arkansas Recycling & Disposal Services (CARDS) expanded its operations by opening a 20,000-square-foot MRF in Springdale, Arkansas. CARDS chose to partner with Machinex on the design of its processing system, and Machinex was able to fit a state-of-the-art MRF into an existing building design.
“When we decided to build a MRF, it was only natural that we include Machinex in the process,” says CARDS President and CEO Dan Christensen.
The 14-tons-per-hour single-stream MRF—the first in CARDS’ portfolio—is equipped with a II RAM baler, a MACH Hyspec® optical sorter and six more pieces of proprietary sorting equipment.
Christensen says he had high hopes for the recycling system as he worked with Machinex to conceive it, and the results exceeded his expectations.
“They were able to execute it ahead of schedule and right on budget, and I couldn’t be happier with the outcome,” Christensen says. “Machinex made it a seamless process for a guy who doesn’t have a lot of experience in recycling. They explained everything along the way and made it really easy for us.”
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