Pacific Steel and Recycling has begun a multimillion-dollar upgrade of its facility in Pocatello, Idaho. The company says the upgrade will allow the company to process more scrap metal and extend their reach to other regions of the state.

The upgrade focuses on the installation of a scrap shear. According to one report, the shear measures 198 feet long and weighs 350,000 pounds. A spokesman for the company says the new machine is a significant upgrade from the facility’s existing equipment.

“The other machines we are using to shear our scrap are excavator-mounted shears,” says Mike Kempel, manager of Pacific Steel and Recycling. “They burn an incredible amount of diesel fuel per hour. So this is going to make us more fuel efficient, more electric efficient and overall, a much more efficient way of handling our scrap material.”

According to Kempel, the guillotine shear will be able to shear scrap iron to any length desired and can also be used for vehicles. “I was able to take a $450,000 piece of equipment and handed it off to one of our other branches because this going to serve the purpose of both a shear and a car logger,” he explains.

Pat Kons, vice president of scrap operations for Pacific Steel, says that the shear is the third of four shears that the company is in the process of installing at facilities throughout its network of scrap metal yards. Kons notes that the company recently commissioned a shear in Spokane, Wash., and will be putting another shear at its shredder location in Billings, Mont. The first of the four shears installed for Pacific was last year in Nampa, Idaho.