Daily Quick Read - August 6, 2019

CA’s Largest Recycling Firm Goes Out of Business

Recycling has never been a highly profitable business.  Recyclers have been caught in a vise between higher operating costs and the lack of market for even the potentially useful material they pick out of our garbage.  Now the largest recycling operation in California has closed.

The state’s largest operator of recycling redemption centers has closed all 284 of its centers, leaving 750 employees without jobs and many who rely on income from redeeming bottles and cans without options.

RePlanet, which runs recycling redemption and processing centers all over California, ceased its operations and will undergo a process to have its assets liquidated and creditors paid, according to a statement from company president and CFO David Lawrence.

“With the continued reduction in State fees, the depressed pricing of recycled aluminum and PET plastic, and the rise in operating costs resulting from minimum wage increases and required health and workers compensation insurance, the Company has concluded that operation of these recycling centers and supporting operations is no longer sustainable,” his statement says.

California's Recycle Crisis

California has aggressive goals for waste management, targeting 75% of all waste to be eliminated or processed instead of dumped into landfills by 2020. In 2017, that number was 42%. Now, facing extreme headwinds, the 2020 target is probably out of reach. A few years ago it was possible to sell bulk plastics for recycling in Asia for $25 per ton. Now, cities need to pay $25 per ton to have this material hauled away. Where it likely ends up in a landfill somewhere in the US.

...the outlook isn’t good. That’s in part because cheap natural gas is spurring investments in manufacturing of virgin plastics, which a CalRecycle report said could “undermine source reduction efforts, undercut prices for recovered plastics, and exacerbate plastic litter and marine pollution issues.”There’s also a major shakeup to the international recycling markets, which affects California because it exports about a third of its recycling, according to CalRecycle estimates.

Historically,the bulk of California’s recycling exports went to China. But in 2013, China temporarily scaled up inspection and enforcement against imports of contaminated recycling. And in 2017, China announced new restrictions on imports and tighter contamination standards for materials including mixed plastics and unsorted paper.

“That started sending recyclers and recycling markets into a tailspin here,” said Kate O’Neill, an associate professor in environmental science at the University of California, Berkeley and an expert on the international waste trade. Since then, countries including Thailand, Vietnam, and India announced plans to ban scrap plastic.

This is a Plastic Bag Ban

When I go to the store and forget to take a shopping bag with me, the store will sell me a "reusable" plastic bag for 10 cents.  That's not much of a penalty to pay and the new bag is even more difficult to recycle than the thin single use bags it replaced.  Image how much more likely I would be to remember my shopping bag if I faced a fine and/or a week in jail.  Africa is leading the way in eliminating plastic bags, not upgrading them.  This is what happened in Tanzania on June 1.  And, Tanzania is one of 34 African countries to implement aggressive plastic bag bans.

A plastic bag ban comes into force in Tanzania on Saturday, as Africa leads efforts to stem the tide of plastic blighting the farthest reaches of the globe, and depths of the ocean.

Tanzania is banning the importation, production, sale and use of plastic bags, becoming the 34th African country to implement such restrictions, according to the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP).

"Let me be clear on this, once it reaches June 1, the government is not planning to add any more days and we will not tolerate anyone who will be caught using them. No plastic bag will be allowed in the country," Tanzania's vice-president Samia Suluhu Hassan said when announcing the move in April.

Tanzania -- whose wildlife is a popular tourist draw -- has also issued a notice to travellers that they will have to "surrender" plastic bags in their possession before entering the country.
"The government expects that, in appreciation of the imperative to protect the environment and keep our country clean and beautiful, our visitors will accept minor inconveniences resulting from the plastic bags ban," said the statement.

According to local media, anyone caught manufacturing or importing plastic bags and plastic wrappings could get a fine of one billion Tanzanian shillings ($430,000, 390,000 euros) or face imprisonment for up to two years.

Possession and usage can lead to a fine of $87 or imprisonment for seven days, or both.

Seven days in a Tanzanian jail for possession of a plastic bag.  Now that's a plastic bag ban.

Buy a Coke, Kill a Bird - Bad Optics Indeed

Coke and Pepsi disturbed by the optics of their membership in the Plastics Industry Association are leaving the group. Of course, two of the companies that are flooding the planet with single use plastic bottles insist they are committed to recycling. So far the evidence of their commitment can be seen in oceans around the planet.

Coca-Cola and PepsiCo, two major sellers of plastic bottles, have made sweeping sustainability commitments. Now they are stepping away from a plastics lobbying group.

Both soft drink companies are trying to increase the amount of recycled plastic they use in bottles. They want to improve recycling infrastructure and ensure their packages are recyclable.

But the Plastics Industry Association has encouraged states to make plastic bans illegal. Participation in the group could tarnish Coca-Cola and Pepsi's images as companies working to find solutions to plastic pollution.

The association took positions that "were not fully consistent with our commitments and goals," Coca-Cola said in a statement last week, noting that it withdrew from the group earlier this year. Pepsi said it had joined the association to learn about innovation as it works to "achieve a circular economy for plastics."

Cutting ties with the Plastic Industry Association is a sign that "companies understand that they cannot publicly say they want to end plastic pollution, while financially supporting an association that lobbies for our continued reliance on throwaway plastics," said Greenpeace USA Oceans Campaign Director John Hocevar in a statement.

The move may help reassure some customers. But as people grow more worried about the negative impacts of plastic pollution on the environment as well as on animal and human health, companies like Pepsi and Coke will have to go even further to find a solution.

Recycling Law vs Reality 

Putting recycling laws on the books isn't the same as actually enforcing recycling laws.  

In fact, California has mandates requiring more recycling. For example, if a buyback recycling center is not within a half-mile radius, large retailers of drinks packaged in California Redemption Value containers must either pay for empty containers in the store or pay $100 per day to the California Department of Resources Recovery and Recycling, according to Assembly Bill 2020, which passed in 1989.

More comprehensive in the scope of businesses covered by a recycling mandate, Assembly Bill 1826 of 2014 requires separate collection of compostable materials from any business generating four of more cubic yards of any kind of solid waste per week.

However, neither of these mandates is enforced. The requirement for bottle and can redemption by stores was the subject early this year of a report by Consumer Watchdog, a nonprofit group, saying this lack of enforcement contributed to Californians loss of $308 million in deposits last year and a decline in bottle and can recycling from 85 percent in 2013 to 75 percent in 2018. The mandate for collection of compostables is on hold, pending the availability of facilities capable of doing the necessary composting.