News Watch

KEEPING AMERICA BEAUTIFUL WITH BOB TIMBERLAKE

Reducing waste, increasing recycling and reusing items bound for the landfill is the focus of the furniture, home furnishings and apparel industries under a program called "Bob Timberlake for Keep America Beautiful." Since the program’s inception in October 1994, licensees of products from sofas and chairs to lamps, mirrors, t-shirts and men’s neckwear have been working with Keep America Beautiful Inc., Stamford, Conn., to conduct waste audits to determine what garbage they produce and how they might better handle it. Some companies are diverting between 80 percent and 90 percent of materials from becoming waste.

The Bob Timberlake program is an alliance between KAB, Bob Timberlake – an internationally-acclaimed realist artist – and 12 licensees of apparel and products for the home. The licensees produce products manufactured with recycled materials such as metal hardware, glass and fibers, as well as using selectively-harvested wood resources and water-based finishes in furniture production.

"The licensees are challenging themselves to go beyond what they may already be doing to reduce waste," says Roger Powers, president of KAB. "They are involving their employees and devoting more time to recycling and re-use programs currently in place, while exploring other areas of their business where waste reduction might be a consideration."

COORS RECOGNIZED FOR REDUCING, REUSING

The Coors Brewing Co., Golden, Colo., recently received the Coalition of Northeastern Governors Challenge Award. The award is made annually to companies that make innovative strides in eliminating waste and reducing the consumption of resources. The governors cited Coors’ 30-year commitment to eliminating waste and paring resource consumption, expanding recycling and finding new ways to reuse packaging products.

Specifically, Coors has reduced the weight of its bottles, cans and paper packaging by 21 percent since 1988; increased post-consumer recycling content of packaging materials to 32 percent; raised the overall recycled content of its aluminum cans to 76 percent; reduced the amount of solid waste that ends up in landfills by an estimated 850,000 tons; and achieved an overall savings of more than $4 million annually through these combined resource reduction efforts.

PRINS SUED BY BALTIMORE COUNTY

Prins Recycling Corp., Ft. Lee, N.J., is being sued by Baltimore County, Md., for more than $1 million the company owes for scrap paper it contracted with the county last June to pick up for recycling. At that time, paper prices were still at a record high, and Prins signed a contract to pay the county $122.50 per ton for the material. Apparently, Prins has not paid for the paper since October, and has attempted to revise the contract. Baltimore County officials have stated that they expect the company to honor the original deal, and have filed a civil suit in the county Circuit Court.

RECYCLING ZONES GET LOW-COST LOANS

Businesses operating within California’s State Recycling Market Development Zones can now get a reduced interest rate on business loans from the California Integrated Waste Management Board, Sacramento. CIWMB lowered its loan rate from 6 percent to 5.8 percent. The 0.2 point reduction means that a firm with a $400,000, seven-year loan would save more than $60,000 in interest costs over the life of the loan.

To date, the CIWMB has issued more than $16 million in loans to 42 businesses. These businesses expect to divert more than 1.3 million tons of waste annually and create about 550 jobs. Two recent loans include $1 million to Marfred Industries, Los Angeles, to make packaging from recycled shipping boxes, and $475,000 to The Porterville Sheltered Workshop in Tulare County to purchase equipment to make fire logs from recycled cardboard and sawdust.

IOWA CREATES BUY RECYCLED GUIDES

Iowa’s Department of Natural Resources has produced two guides to buying recycled products for purchasing agents. The first, entitled The Recycled Product Directory, lists recycled products that are currently available from Iowa manufacturers. The other, A Business Guide To Buying Recycled, describes how any business can establish or expand a recycled products purchasing program.

"Recycled products are no longer a special order item only," says Beth Hicks, recycling specialist with the DNR. "But, by encouraging the demand for recycled products, we can reduce their cost, improve their quality and increase their availability."

For more information about the directory and guide, call (515) 281-4367.

WASHINGTON COUNTY HITS RECYCLING GOAL

Pierce County, Washington, has reached the goal of recycling 50 percent of its waste stream, becoming the first county to hit the statewide goal set five years ago by the Washington Deptartment of Ecology.

At the time the goal was set, Pierce County (which includes the city of Tacoma) was only recycling 20 percent of its waste stream. Since then, the county has recycled more than 2 million tons of material. County officials point to "tremendous cooperation" from private waste haulers and commercial buyers who helped make sure there was a viable end market for recycled materials.

RECYCLING HANDBOOK NOW PRINTED IN ENGLISH

A guide entitled The Handbook of Recycling Techniques, by Alfred Nijkerk, is available in English for the first time. Originally published in Dutch, this 176-page reference covers more than 200 different recycling techniques and features 205 illustrations.

To order the handbook, call American Metal Market at (212) 887-8532.

Minnesota Resort Recycling A Success

The state of Minnesota, which boasts the highest recycling rate in the United States at 44 percent, has just completed a successful resort recycling study. The study was performed by the Minnesota Office of Environmental Assistance and conducted at resorts located in the northwestern Minnesota counties of Douglas and Cass.

The five-month survey revealed that visitors to the resorts appreciated the option of recycling and highly approved of resorts that implemented the pilot program. Of the 275 visitors responding to the survey, 90 percent claimed to recycle at home; 87 percent noted the importance of recycling and indicated that if programs were available, they would recycle while vacationing; and 73 percent highlighted clearly-labeled recycling containers as being the most effective method of informing visitors about recycling programs.

During the project, resort owners reported significant increases in their recycling rates, from 50 percent to 100 percent. One interesting finding was that respondents at smaller resorts collected more recyclables than the larger participating resorts.