Living Large

The recycling of basic materials consists of several steps, and for a healthy percentage of old newspapers (ONP), polyethylene terephthalate (PET) beverage bottles and aluminum used beverage containers (UBCs), that first step is to be picked up on a residential waste and recycling route.

The establishment of municipal recycling programs and curbside collection in the past three decades has brought solid waste companies—or companies that used to be considered as only solid waste companies—fully into recycling.

The capital-intensive involvement of these companies in not just the collection but also the processing of these recyclables is reflected in their domination as the owners and operators of a majority of the 75 largest MRFs in North America, as identified by the staff and readers of Recycling Today.

A map and list of those 75 MRFs, sponsored by recycling equipment maker Machinex Industries, Plessisville, Quebec, appears as a fold-out insert in the printed issue. To access a pdf version of the guide click here.

Twice earlier this decade, Recycling Today has presented a list of what it identified as the 20 Largest MRFs in the U.S.

For those lists, as with this year’s list and map, Recycling Today chose to include facilities that process 50 percent or more residentially generated material. Facilities with a higher mix of commercially generated material may also take in bottles, cans and other commodities, but these facilities are instead considered when our "20 Largest Paperstock Dealers" list is updated and published.

As with the past lists, we have chosen the amount of scrap paper shipped as the yardstick for ranking order on the list. Although containers make up an important portion of the volume at most MRFs, this volume can be greatly reduced in the residential collection stream in states with deposit-and-return bottle bills. Thus, MRFs in bottle bill states would be at an immediate disadvantage if total recyclables were used to rank facilities.

Although the criteria have stayed the same in 2009, this year’s presentation goes deeper, with a listing of 75 MRFs instead of 20 and a map offering a view of where the major-league MRFs are located. Additionally, www.RecyclingToday.com offers an interactive version of this same map to Recycling Today subscribers whenever they need to view it.

As with any list presented in Recycling Today, it has relied on the help and cooperation of readers—in this case the recycling companies that operate the MRFs sorting and baling the ONP, PET bottles, UBCs and other secondary commodities that flow into residential recycling programs in North America.

Through publicity and information gathering efforts, we have tried to let every MRF out there have a chance to be included. Thank you to those companies that have supplied information, and for those who have chosen not to, we hope you’ll reconsider next time.

A scan through the list of the largest volume MRFs demonstrates that the nation’s largest hauling companies have to a great extent chosen to retain recyclable materials through the processing and selling stages. While these companies may own landfills in many of the markets they serve, they also run processing plants that prepare recyclables to be shipped out in containers to global markets.

Waste Management Recycle America (WMRA), Houston, is the most common corporate name on the list.

The company’s widespread presence on this list backs up the claim, made on its Web site, that "Waste Management collects and processes more municipal recyclables than any other company in North America."

The WMRA MRF in Pembroke Pines, Fla., is among the 10 largest in North America. Farther down the list, WMRA appears as the owner and operator of an impressive number of facilities that sort, bale and ship from 30,000 to 100,000 tons per year of recovered paper.

The company is far from the only MRF operator with roots in the solid waste hauling and landfill business. Also appearing multiple times is Republic Services, Phoenix, Ariz., which in 2008 acquired fellow waste and recycling company Allied Waste.

Among the largest MRFs operated by the newly merged company are plants in Washington, Minnesota, California and Utah. The company’s Rabanco Recycling MRF in Seattle shipped more than 120,000 tons of recovered fiber in 2008.

Regional companies with solid waste roots that have added recycling capabilities also populate the list, with companies such as Casella Waste Systems, Deffenbaugh Industries and Homewood Disposal fitting that description.

Also appearing on the MRF list and map are facilities run by companies for whom recycling has long been (or always been) the predominant activity.

Several companies on the list began by recycling commercial and industrial materials but later added a residential or MRF component. Far West Fibers of Oregon, Great Lakes Recycling of Michigan and Canada Fibers Ltd. and Metro Waste Paper Recovery (both based in Ontario, Canada) fit this description.

A newer company that operates several large tonnage MRFs is Greenstar North America (NA), a subsidiary of an Irish company.

Greenstar has taken the approach of operating large MRFs in metropolitan markets that it says can serve as, essentially, "neutral party" plants for haulers who don’t wish to bring material to MRFs operated by competing haulers.

Greenstar NA has opened large tonnage MRFs in California, Texas and Pennsylvania, with its San Antonio plants handling more than 130,000 tons combined of recovered fiber annually.

The amount of scrap paper and other secondary commodities churning through North America’s largest MRFs on an annual basis is impressive.

Even with the commodity value plunge of late 2008, these facilities have continued to take in and prepare the range of scrap commodities that is generated in residential neighborhoods but collected, sorted, processed and shipped out on an industrial scale.

The author is editor in chief of Recycling Today and can be contacted at btaylor@gie.net. Research for the MRF map and list was conducted by DeAnne Toto, Zack Lloyd and Dan Sandoval.