Nonmetallics

A leading scrap firm has joined forces with a chemical giant to operate a recycling facility that came on line this fall. Philip Services Corp., Hamilton, Ontar-io, and BASF Corp.’s Polymers Division, Mount Olive, N.J., opened what it is billing as the first rigid polyurethane recycling facility in North America.

Rigid polyurethanes are found in automotive steering wheels, side view mirrors, bumpers and spoilers and have not been widely recycled, although they account for up to 20 percent of the plastic found in the average vehicle.

The recycled polyurethane, or polyols, will be marketed by BASF to the automotive industry and will be competitively priced to compete with virgin polyols, according to the company. BASF says it will be working with the auto industry to develop end markets for the recycled polyols.

The new facility, located in Detroit, will initially accept scrap polyurethane from auto companies and automotive suppliers. "Our hope is that by mid-1998 we’ll be in a position to accept post-consumer scrap," says Tom Randazzo, senior vice president of Philip Services Corp. The company will be installing a super sized shredder at its facility in Hamilton, and will initially remove bumpers from vehicles brought there and send them to the Detroit plant.

SIERRA PLASTIC LANDS KOREAN CONTRACT

Sierra Plastic Technologies Inc., Ashland, Va., has signed a contract with the government of South Korea to refurbish 12 government-operated recycling facilities. Paul Vanderpool, Sierra Plastic’s vice president of sales, says the facilities are having difficulty achieving the desired purity in recovering agricultural film. South Korea has an extensive greenhouse vegetable industry that uses large quantities of potentially recyclable polyethylene film. Sierra is being asked to design and produce equipment that will allow the facilities to reach their recycling goals.

PBA SEEKS UPDATE

The Plastic Bag Association (PBA), Pittsburgh, is asking supermarket operators for updated information on plastic bag recycling collection sites. The PBA is updating the database established five years ago known as the Plastic Bag Information Clearinghouse. Consumers calling the Clearinghouse’s phone number are matched by ZIP code to nearby store locations that accept plastic bags for recycling.

CHAMPION TO SELL MILLS, RECYCLING PLANTS

Champion International Corp., Stamford, Conn., has announced plans to sell more than a dozen facilities to improve its balance sheet. The company will sell off the assets of several product segments with 1996 net sales of $1.4 billion, including newsprint, the recycling business, groundwood specialty papers, both coated and uncoated, premium papers, specialty uncoated papers, liquid packaging and bleached board, as well as 325,000 acres of timberlands.

According to several sources, the recycling division has been posting steep monthly losses, and recently laid off a number of division employees.

CPC TOUTS BOXING DAYS

The Corrugated Packaging Council (CPC), Rolling Meadows, Ill., is sponsoring a Boxing Days promotion that can be adopted by communities throughout North America. The two-week promotion is aimed at recovering the abundant amount of corrugated packaging left over from the December holiday season. A Boxing Days Kit, available to regional governments and recycling coordinators, includes a guide to implementing and promoting a successful Boxing Days program. The suggested dates for the promotion are December 26 through January 10.

EUROPE BURIED IN PAPER

Mandated recycling rates have created a supply glut of post-consumer paper, according to one presenter at the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR) fall convention in Munich. Under the influence of the European Union Packaging Directive, recovery of paper has risen in five years from 39 percent to nearly 50 percent, says Heiko Bayerl, managing director of Kartonfabrik Reiger GmbH, Germany. But while recovered paper supplies increased, there has not been a parallel increase in demand.

Bayerl used Germany as an example of the supply-demand imbalance. His country’s recovery rate in the five-year period went from 43.5 percent to 70.6 percent, while the use of recycled material could go no higher than 60.3 percent in 1996. Bayerl believes the 60 percent figure represents the saturation point. He pointed out that exports to Asia provided a temporary safety valve, but that outlet has "become clogged and no increase [in exports] could be expected." The availability of the vast volumes of paper has created depressed European secondary fibre prices.