Coalition of municipalities poised to buy Hampden, Maine, recycling facility

A municipal solid waste facility (MSW) in Hampden, Maine, could soon be purchased by the Municipal Review Committee Inc. (MRC), a nonprofit organization overseeing MSW issues for 115 municipalities in coastal Maine.

During a June 29 MRC meeting, Eaton Peabody attorney Shawn Doil, representing the committee, said two lienholders who had been objecting to the sale have agreed in principle to a resolution.

The organization has departed from a prior plan to seek financing from its member towns and cities, MRC President Karen Fussell said.

“We’re actually working with a number of good potential private sector partners that we might work with to share ownership and operation of the facility,” she said.

Doil said she anticipates the sale should close sometime in the next several weeks.

Closed since May 2020, the Coastal Resources of Maine waste-to-energy facility would provide MSW collection and recycling for residents in the 115 towns the MRC serves. Coastal Resources of Maine LLC is subsidiary of Fiberight, whose technology is in the Hampden facility.

For the past two years, the MRC has monitored and maintained the shuttered 144,000-square-foot facility, paid its utilities and protected the equipment within, according to an MRC document on the plan to buy the facility, all while seeking a buyer and operator for the facility. However, several interested parties were unable to demonstrate the technical and financial capabilities necessary to own and operate the recycling facility.

The MRC anticipates the final purchase price of the facility will range from $1 million to $1.5 million, but the startup cost could be around $20 million.

An MRC overview of the facility says it was the first U.S. recycling facility with an integrated pulper that can process items such as dirty paper plates, coffee cups and pizza boxes in addition to more routine recyclables. The facility is capable of diverting from landfill 60 percent to 80 percent of the material it receives.

The MRC says in its redevelopment plan for the facility that it should be able to turn a profit at full operation, which would include an investment of up to $5 million, but market conditions for recycling commodities and cellulose pulp also have improved markedly since the May 2020 closure which was around the time of the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic.