The California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle) has announced that Action Sales and Metal, Los Angeles, has agreed to pay $1.8 million to CalRecycle in restitution to the state’s Beverage Container Recycling Program as part of a settlement agreement resulting from illegal claims for refunds on out-of-state bottles and cans.

Additionally, the company and its owner Bruce Falk are barred from future participation in the program.

CalRecycle says it received $845,000 of the settlement Feb. 11, 2015, when the agreement was signed; the remaining $955,000, seized from the business by law enforcement during two separate investigations, will be released to CalRecycle in mid-March.

The settlement comes on the heels of an investigation by CalRecycle, the California Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

“CalRecycle is dedicated to protecting the Beverage Container Recycling Fund and going after people who steal from the program,” says Caroll Mortensen, CalRecycle director. “These are public funds—they are owed to consumers who pay CRV (California Redemption Value) when they buy beverages and then return the containers for recycling. We will vigorously pursue these investigations, and we won’t back down until perpetrators are held accountable for their actions.”

The case began in 2012 when the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s Metals Theft Unit began investigating a group that was suspected of importing used beverage containers (UBCs) from Arizona and redeeming them at Action Sales and Metal for CRV refunds. During a search, officers found receipts indicating Action Sales and Metal paid more than $700,000 in CRV to the suspects for ineligible material, according to CalRecycle.

Meanwhile, the California DOJ was conducting a parallel investigation, based on a referral from CalRecycle, on another group of people suspected of transporting beverage containers to Action Sales and Metal for illegal CRV claims.

California DOJ agents followed a rental truck carrying UBCs from Mesa, Arizona, to a Wilmington, California, residence, according to CalRecycle. The next day, agents observed as the load was divided into smaller quantities and taken to Action Sales and Metal, where the material was redeemed for CRV. Four people later were arrested, including Falk, who was held on $1 million bail.

Falk was charged with recycling fraud, conspiracy and grand theft and was indicted. In May 2014, the jury found Action Sales and Metal guilty of conspiracy to commit a crime, grand theft of personal property and recycling fraud, CalRecycle reports. However, as part of the negotiated settlement, the charges against Falk were dismissed.

California’s bottle bill provides an incentive for beverage container recycling by establishing a CRV of 5 cents for containers holding less than 24 ounces and 10 cents for containers holding 24 ounces or more. However, CRV only applies to beverages in qualifying containers that were purchased within California. Out-of-state containers are not eligible for CRV.

Executives and managers who guide paper manufacturing firms based in India can offer a litany of reasons why their jobs are difficult. Working in their favor, however, is a growing middle class and an anticipated 7 percent annual rise in GDP in India in 2015.

From left, Brian Taylor of Recycling Today, P.R. Ray of Esskay Impex and Arun Bijur of SPB Projects and Consultancy.

In a discussion and question-and-answer session at the 2015 Paper Recycling Conference India event, held in New Delhi in late January, a paper trader and an industry consultant offered their observations on the opportunities and challenges facing India’s paper manufacturing sector.

Estimates of how many paper mills are operating in India range up to 800 said Arun Bijur of SPB Projects and Consultancy [http://www.spbpc.com/home.htm], Chennai, India. Bijur, who has nearly four decades of paper industry experience, said access to financing and increasing government scrutiny in areas such as pollution prevention will likely lead to some consolidation.

Fellow panelist P.R. Ray of Esskay Impex, Kolkata, India, said family-owned papermaking companies will remain part of the landscape in India. “Personally, I do not see the end of fragmentation of family businesses,” said Ray. He added, however, that the paper sector in India is suffering from a low level of investment in plant and equipment, since institutional investors “do not find themselves interested in investing in this sector.”

Bijur commented that if the quality of recovered fiber declines both overseas and within India, mills that can invest in new stock preparation systems may elbow out some competitors. “Given a disparity between mills that can accept lower quality materials and those that cannot, we can expect that some smaller or vintage mills will go out of business. That is a way the industry can progress,” he remarked.

Compared to North America and Europe, India enjoys a growing print media market, both panelists agreed. India’s growing literate population enjoys its access to regional newspapers in a wide variety of languages, noted Bijur, and the income of these newspapers is bolstered by the placement of mandatory government and private sector announcements.

Ray noted that print media revenue in India is not merely fighting to stay level as it is in the West, but rather has grown by a double-digit percentage in the last 10 years.

Regarding packaging grades, Ray said India is experiencing rapid growth in kraft paper production rather than seeing major investments in containerboard mills. Unless India becomes a more vigorous manufacturer of exported goods, that trend may continue, since India relies largely on kraft grades for products made for internal consumption.

Paper Recycling Conference India was held Jan. 29-30 at the Taj Palace Hotel in New Delhi.

In the Indian steelmaking sector, the basic oxygen furnace (BOF) plays the major role at facilities large enough to be called a mill.

However, according to Jitendra Singh, president of the All India Induction Furnaces Association (AIIFA), New Delhi, BOF mills make only slightly more than half of the finished steel in India each year. The majority of the rest of the steel is not made by electric arc furnace (EAF) mills, but rather by smaller-volume induction furnace shops.

The AIIFA estimates there are more than 1,300 induction furnaces installed in India, said Singh. Ferrous scrap has traditionally been “imported individually by each consumer to meet their requirements,” he added.

At a presentation at the 2015 Metals Recycling Association of India (MRAI) meeting in Mumbai in February, Singh said these induction furnaces can melt either direct reduced iron (DRI), also known as sponge iron, or ferrous scrap. Melting scrap can offer several advantages, said Singh, however “there are only 18 million metric tons of ferrous scrap collected in India” each year.

With installed induction furnace capacity of more than 30 million metric tons in India, that scrap figure indicates a shortfall even before the scrap needs of India’s BOF or EAF sectors are considered.

Subsequently, DRI “became the main feedstock” for the induction sector, Singh told MRAI delegates, although scrap has gained ground and is nearing the 50% level, he added.

Singh said the production of DRI requires more energy and creates slag. DRI itself has a limited life span before it degrades and can potentially harbor smoldering fires. Currently, many steelmakers are exploring setting up “mini pellet plants” to create DRI pellets made from iron ore fines, he noted.

If scrap processors in India can seek out and find additional ferrous scrap, commented Singh, induction furnace operators will have an interest in using it.

The 2015 MRAI International Conference was February 5-6 at the Renaissance Mumbai Convention Centre and Hotel.

India’s metal recycling rates are believed to be considerably lower than those in North America or Europe. An influx of vehicles on India’s streets and highways, however, should lead to more metals recovery in the years ahead.

Several speakers at the 2015 Metal Recycling Association of India (MRAI) International Conference, held in Mumbai in February, referred to India’s growing sales figures and production numbers in the vehicle sector as a factor in the scrap recycling industry’s future.

The millions of vehicles that have been streaming onto India’s roads in the past several years includes trucks, cars, motorcycles, scooters and three-wheeled auto rickshaws.

Although drivers in India are likely to extend the lives of vehicles until they cannot be driven another mile, the sheer number of additional vehicles hitting the road each year will lead to a greater number of end-of-life vehicles (ELVs) in India in the next five to 10 years,

Mohan Agarwal of India-based aluminum producer Century Metal Recycling told MRAI delegates that India has risen to become the seventh largest automaker globally and the second largest producer of two-wheeled vehicles (motor scooters and motorcycles).

Presenter Goto-San from Toyota Tsusho India Pvt. Ltd. said his company’s forecasts show India’s passenger vehicles sales may zoom from 2.2 million vehicles sold in 2010 to 4.6 million units in 2015 and then 10.6 million units in 2021.

The ELVs will become “an important part of urban mining resources in India,” said Goto-San, adding that for Toyota Tsusho and other companies, “the opportunities in India are promising.’

A stream of ELVs in India would be a welcome development for recyclers. A study conducted for the MRAI by Frost & Sullivan and summarized at the February meeting by Venkatesan Subramanian, who works for that research firm in New Delhi, found that India’s current scrap iron and steel recycling rate could be as low as 12%, while its copper and aluminum recycling rates are at 45 percent and 50 percent respectively.

The 2015 MRAI International Conference was February 5-6 at the Renaissance Mumbai Convention Centre and Hotel.