AmpleTech Refresh, Phoenix, has joined The Electronics Reuse & Recycling Alliance’s (TERRA's) Done with IT program, which is designed to provide simple and safe electronics recycling options for businesses and individuals across Arizona and surrounding states, TERRA reports in a news release.

TERRA describes itself a the largest network of e-Stewards and Responsible Recycling (R2) Certified electronics recycling and information technology asset disposition (ITAD) solution providers in North America with secure facilities across the United States, Canada and Mexico.

According to TERRA, its Done with IT mail-in program provides access to simple, secure and sustainable electronics recycling options for individuals, businesses and local governments across the U.S. and Canada. This service is especially critical for rural and urban communities with little or no access to electronics recycling services and protects them from identity theft while safeguarding the environment and human health, TERRA says.

"Only certified businesses like AmpleTech adhere to rigorous standards and ongoing oversight that protect individuals and organizations against data breach and effectively mitigate the dangers associated with the improper disposal of e-waste," says Steven Napoli, president and CEO of TERRA.

"An expanding home-based workforce increases the value of having convenient access to data destruction, device refurbishment and remarketing services," says Kesh Kesic, president of AmpleTech. "Our partnership with TERRA helps us connect our certified solutions to those in need of these essential services.

Prime Materials Recovery (PMR), East Hartford, Connecticut, is partnering with Cunext Group, headquartered in Córdoba, Spain, on a joint venture that will build a new copper smelter in Shelby, North Carolina.

Ames Copper Group, the joint venture, plans to invest $26.3 million to build the facility, which will recycle and purify copper materials.

Currently, PMR’s affiliate, IMC Metals America, employs a 76-person workforce in the state, manufacturing copper for wiring and lightning rods, as well as applications in the defense industry.

Bernard Schilberg, CEO of PMR, says the partners looked at three areas where PMR currently has locations before deciding to site the plant in North Carolina. While it was a difficult decision, he says the workforce and incentives the state was offering made North Carolina the right place to build the smelter.

Cunext and PMR share synergies, Schilberg says, with Cunext having experience in copper mining and refining and PMR having experience in direct melting of copper scrap.

The smelter has been in the planning stages for more than a year. Schilberg says China’s restrictions on copper scrap imports and the oversupply they have created in the U.S. market prompted the venture, as did the demand for copper anodes in North America. “We will be able to compete globally with the new efficient technology we are implementing.”

Ames Copper Group will purchase birch/cliff, No. 2 copper chops with a minimum of 90 percent copper content and copper-bearing scrap and copper alloys with a minimum of 85 percent copper content. Schilberg says the smelter will consume 54,000 tons of scrap annually to produce 50,000 tons of 99.7 percent copper custom anodes.

While PMR will supply some of the scrap, he says, “a substantial amount will be purchased outside of PMR” and from throughout North, South and Central America.

Ames Copper Group will install a 180-ton tilting furnace and a casting wheel as well as pollution control equipment. “We are in the permitting process as we speak,” Schilberg says. “We feel very comfortable with the position that we’ve taken. We are an incredibly socially conscious company. We feel that the technology and engineering going into this project will be state of the art. This will be the Cadillac among the copper smelting facilities in the world.”

He expects the plant to be operational in the fourth quarter of 2022.  

Ames Copper Group will create 46 jobs in Cleveland County, North Carolina, including casting workers, maintenance personnel, supervisors and administrative staff.

A performance-based grant of $150,000 from the One North Carolina Fund will help locate Ames Copper Group to Cleveland County. The One N.C. Fund provides financial assistance to local governments to help attract economic investment and to create jobs. Companies receive no money upfront and must meet job creation and capital investment targets to qualify for payment. All One N.C. grants require a matching grant from local governments and any award is contingent upon that condition being met.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) says it has undertaken a nationwide expansion of its “interactive dataset that maps recyclers and landfills for the planning, response and recovery of debris” created by a natural disaster.

Says the EPA, “This debris recovery tool has already proven valuable in training exercises and response activity to natural disasters.”

“EPA is prepared to help communities more rapidly recover from natural disasters,” says EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler. “EPA’s debris recovery tool will assist federal, state, local and tribal emergency personnel to quickly identify recycling, composting and disposal facilities near affected areas that may be able to accept disaster debris.”

The expansion of the recovery tool was supported by the E-Enterprise Initiative that emphasizes collaboration and data sharing among EPA, states and tribes. The agency says the recovery tool “advances EPA’s goals of recycling and material recovery following natural disasters, such as hurricanes, and is one of several resources mentioned in EPA’s Planning for Natural Disaster Debris Guidance.”

The recovery tool also can be used by local governments to identify potential facilities before a disaster occurs, which ideally can help communities recover faster. “Better management of debris may reduce injuries, minimize or prevent the environmental impacts of mismanaged wastes and ultimately support compliance with environmental regulations,” states the EPA.

Early adoption of the interactive tool in the U.S. EPA’s Chicago-based Region 5 office has already led to successful disaster debris management planning for the Mille Lacs Band of the Ojibwe tribe in Minnesota and in tornado response by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, says the U.S. EPA.

More information on the EPA’s debris recovery tool can be found on this web page.

The European aluminum industry “needs additional instruments to address the harmful effects of Chinese subsidies” says Brussels-based European Aluminium, a trade group whose members include more than 80 producers of the metal.

The organization says it is calling upon the European Commission “to effectively address the distortive effects of foreign subsidies in the EU single market and help create a level playing field for the aluminum industry in Europe.”

European Aluminium says a proposed white paper on the topic “must be urgently translated into effective measures.” Adds the group, “The European aluminum industry is buckling under the pressure of subsidized excess capacity from China.”

States Gerd Götz, director general of European Aluminium, “The EU’s current trade toolbox is far from adequate to defend European industries against the aggressive approach of global powers such as China. The EU needs a more ambitious trade policy to level the global playing field, facilitate supply chain diversification within the EU, and reinforce our defense against unfair trade practices.”

The organization says the “unfairly subsidized” Chinese aluminum has led not only to what it calls “underpriced” Chinese exports, but the metal also has “a high carbon footprint, threatening the competitiveness of European producers and Europe’s sustainability ambitions.”

Most exported Chinese aluminum is made from virgin ore. While European Aluminium’s members include primary aluminum producers, it also includes makers of extruded, rolled and cast aluminum and other producers of recycled-content aluminum.

The organization as a whole has adopted a “Circular Aluminium Action Plan” designed to allow scrap to make up 50 percent of Europe’s aluminum feedstock needs by 2030.

Regarding action against emissions-heavy Chinese imports, Götz states, “The aluminum industry cannot afford to wait much longer.” He cites an (OECD) report that concluded that “nonmarket forces were responsible for some of the recent increases in aluminum smelting capacity, with detrimental impacts throughout the value chain.”

That report indicates that global aluminum companies received up to $70 billion in different forms of support from 2013 to 2017 period, with 85 percent of the documented subsidies going to just five Chinese firms, according to European Aluminium.

“State support has allowed Chinese producers to rapidly increase their production and export subsidized products at dumped prices, leading to global market distortions and depressed global aluminum prices,” states the organization.

Today, China produces 57 percent of the world’s primary aluminum compared to 11 percent in 2004, says European Aluminium.

“The Chinese aluminum industry has already built up massive volumes and is capable of entirely replacing the European aluminum industry if the EU does not act assertively,” states Götz.