Waste Connections, Toronto, has released its 2022 Sustainability Report highlighting advancement toward the company’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) targets, including the addition of one for emissions reduction.

The updated report provides expanded ESG-related disclosure with the introduction of the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) reporting framework, as well as a new sustainability microsite and ESG hub.

“Our updated Sustainability Report details the efforts of over 20,000 employees who embody our values, culture and shared view of sustainability as integral to our strategy for long-term value creation,” Waste Connections President and CEO Worthing F. Jackman says. “In 2021, we demonstrated continued progress towards our ESG targets, as well as further improvement in our ‘net zero’ position and a two-year reduction in emissions intensity of 18 percent, as we decreased emissions while achieving outsized growth during the period. We believe these results and our ongoing investments in sustainability-related projects are emblematic of our commitment to the environment, our employees and the communities we are privileged to serve.” 

Waste Connections increased its revenue by 14 percent while reducing Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 7 percent since 2019, driving an 18 percent reduction in emissions intensity. The report also includes reducing Scope 1 and 2 emissions by 15 percent, which the company calls an “aspirational goal.”

“We continue to raise the bar on accountability with the introduction of a target for further reductions in Scope 1 and 2 emissions, along with a commitment to work toward the adoption of a science-based target initiative (SBTI) emissions reduction target,” Jackman says.

Waste Connections also improved its beyond-net-zero position by expanding its net climate benefit ratio as internally generated operational offsets resulted in the avoidance of 3.4 times the emissions generated from its operations in 2021.

The company increased biogas recovery in 2021 and plans to develop 10 projects during the next two to five years.

In 2021, the company also increased its recycling tonnage and began construction of two greenfield, state-of-the-art recycling facilities that should be completed by 2024.

On the workforce front, Waste Connections reduced its incident rate with 55 percent of its facilities reporting zero incidents or year-over-year reductions in incidents. The company also says it improved employee engagement as measured by the annual servant leadership survey.

The company continued COVID-19-related discretionary investments in employee support in 2022, bringing total outlay since the beginning of the pandemic to more than $50 million.

Kuusakoski Oy says it is setting up a $7 million wire and cable recycling plant for “aluminum- and copper-containing materials” that will be completed next year in Heinola, Finland. The company calls the facility part of its multiyear investment program designed to increase capacity, enhance material yield and deliver cleaner recycled raw material products.

”Our new copper center is unique in Finland,” President and CEO Mikko Kuusilehto says. “With this investment, we are able to serve our customers more locally, which is not only more sustainable for the [the] environment but also financially profitable—both for us and for our customers.”

Kuusakoski, based in Finland, says equipment at the new plant will be able to process copper- and aluminum-containing cables and separate the metals before the copper fraction is refined by Kuusakoski in Heinola and the aluminum fraction proceeds to a separate smelter.

The facility is intended to process cables, radiators, transformers and other copper-containing scrap generated within Finland. Until now, the company has only had a similar operation in neighboring Sweden.

The facility consists of a precrushing line and a separation line. In the precrushing line, the material is crushed and separated using magnetic separators and a windscreen. With a windscreen, paper can be removed from transformer copper. Some of the materials are already end products after having completed the precrushing process, Kuusakoski says.

In the separation line, the remaining material is granulated into small particles to enable separation. For example, based on the weight of the particles, aluminum, copper and plastic can be separated and collected from cables and radiators.

“By producing cleaner copper and aluminum fractions, we provide our customers with a higher utilization rate of recycled material,” Kuusilehto says. “The whole of society benefits from this. Emission savings achieved by Kuusakoski's products, our carbon handprint, is over 10 times more than the emissions caused, our carbon footprint.”

With a production capacity of about 2.5 tons per hour, about 40 tons of copper can be produced per week at the plant, the company estimates. That corresponds to the amount of copper used in approximately 500 electric vehicles.

The chopping facility under construction will be integrated into Kuusakoski's copper refining plant in Heinola. Kuusakoski says the chopping line will help improve the competitiveness of its Heinola plant, which it calls the largest integrated recycling plant in Northern Europe.

Some of the largest stainless steel recycling companies are based in Europe, which has been the home of an unwelcome percentage of the world’s geopolitical turmoil in 2022. That could be why industry players there have made moves to prepare for an uncertain market in the near-term future.

The factors causing concern in Europe are clear to see: 1) Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which has reduced the invaded nation’s capacity to produce metal; 2) sanctions against Russia that have made metal produced there unwelcome in some parts of the world, coupled with Russia cutting off European steel producers from some energy supplies; 3) nickel contract trading turmoil on the London Metal Exchange (LME) in the first quarter of 2022; and 4) global electric vehicle (EV) sales momentum that seemingly will place a supply strain on nickel because of the metal’s use in EV batteries.

As good corporate managers are expected to do, executives in the stainless steel production and recycling sector have responded to the conditions with moves designed to prepare them for any and all market conditions.

Contingency planning

Recycling and trading companies well understand the cyclical nature of their business, so retaining access to cash on hand and a healthy balance sheet are always on the agenda.

The second half of 2022 has seen this thought illustrated in announcements by two prominent stainless and specialty alloy recycling companies. In early October, Cronimet Holding GmbH, a Germany-based processing and trading firm, announced it had extended an existing syndicated loan agreement until 2025 with a consortium of 13 European banks.

“The early extension and the increase in the credit volume are a strong sign from the banking market and give us financing security for the upcoming years, which are likely to be rather difficult in view of the current geopolitical and economic environment,” says Bernhard Kunsmann, chief financial officer of Cronimet.

The Cronimet agreement involved an increase of the loan volume by more than 100 million euros ($98 million) to approximately 700 million euros ($686 million), according to the firm. The company also says the financing package includes a credit line that allows Cronimet to “respond more flexibly to the market environment and, in particular, to volatilities in the raw materials markets.”

In August and again in late October, Netherlands-based Oryx Stainless Group announced agreements designed to increase its “financial flexibility” by establishing or extending credit facilities in Europe and Asia.

In Europe, the firm announced a credit line established in August in the amount of 125 million euros ($127 million). In its comments, Oryx stressed opportunity more so than threats.

That arrangement, Oryx says, replaced an existing such facility at what it calls an early stage. The stainless steel recycling and trading company says the move was made “against a background of higher raw material prices and delivery volumes.”

In the announcement, made jointly by Oryx and HSBC Deutschland, the metals trading firm says, “This refinance guarantees sufficient liquidity for further growth planning.” Oryx says the credit agreement serves mainly to finance the working capital of the European Group companies and to provide collateral in connection with its commodity hedging business and adds that the arrangement “is parallel to a credit agreement in Thailand for the Asian business of the group.”

In late October, the company’s Oryx Stainless (Thailand) Co. Ltd. business unit says it had secured an increased line of credit of 1 billion Thai baht ($26.2 million) “to support growing business demand.”

The firm says its new “amendment and restatement agreement” has increased and extended its revolving borrowing base credit facility by 340 million Thai baht ($8.9 million) from 660 million ($17.3 million) Thai baht to 1 billion Thai baht. The extension adds three years to the arrangement.

The moves by both stainless scrap firms point to the notion that volatility and risk in several forms are a concern for producers, users and traders of stainless steel and other nickel products.

Regional differences

Multilocation stainless steel and specialty alloys producer Acerinox S.A., in its most recent earnings report, refers to geopolitical turmoil but also points to regional differences regarding its effects.

The Madrid-based company reports that it shipped less metal in this year’s third quarter compared with last year’s, citing “weakness in apparent demand once the inventory rebuilding process was completed” among some of its customers.

“The change in our customers’ expectations has caused inventories to be high in most markets, starting a regularization process, which we expect to be completed by the beginning of 2023,” Acerinox CEO Bernardo Velázquez says.

In the United States, where the company operates the North America Stainless (NAS) mill in Kentucky, Velázquez says, “The outlook for the American market, our main market, is positive, while the European market is dominated by uncertainty due to the war and high energy prices.”

Looking ahead, Velázquez points to NAS and Acerinox VDM high-performance alloys operations in the U.S. as a likely bright spot in the fourth quarter of this year and into 2023. VDM Metals, which Acerinox acquired in 2020, operates five specialty alloys melt shops in Europe and two in the U.S.

“Our main market, the United States, maintains a better tone than the rest of the markets,” Velázquez says regarding the near-term outlook for Acerinox. “This is expected to continue in the coming months.”

Economic concerns in Europe have focused on the continent’s lack of imported Russian natural gas for the upcoming winter. Expensive natural gas procured on the spot market has allowed many nations to build up their reserves of natural gas. However, those who dislike the cold will not be the only ones rooting for a mild winter, as metals producers and other large-scale energy consumers will be keeping a close eye on the weather.

Ineos Olefins & Polymers Europe and Plastic Energy have announced a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to produce 100,000 metric tons per year of recycled raw materials from plastic scrap.

The companies say the production site in Köln (Cologne), Germany, will involve “the largest use of Plastic Energy technology on the market.” The recycled-content “Tacoil” produced “will enable a circular approach to produce essential plastic items that meet the requirements of demanding food contact and medical applications,” say the companies.

Ineos, “Plastic Energy’s patented TAC recycling technology will turn difficult-to-recycle plastic waste otherwise destined for incineration or landfill into a valuable raw material [known as] Tacoil, a Plastic Energy product that can be used to create virgin-quality polymers," Ineos says, with the London-based company adding it also will invest in technology to process the Tacoil and feed it to its steam crackers, where it will replace traditional raw materials derived from oil.

“This use of advanced recycling enables plastic waste to be turned into new, virgin-quality materials that can be used in demanding applications where safety standards require the highest level of product purity and performance,” according to Ineos.

“Our position is that advanced recycling has to be done at scale in order to make the process environmentally and commercially viable," says Rob Ingram, CEO of the Ineos business unit involved. I’m therefore delighted to take this first step with Plastic Energy towards building that kind of capability from day one.”

Carlos Monreal, founder and CEO of Plastic Energy, says, “We are pleased to announce this project with Ineos to further scale our portfolio of plants in Europe. Tacoil from our recycling process has already been used in products that have been commercialized on the European market, and we look forward to working with Ineos to enable the production of more recycled content.”

Ineos and United Kingdom-based Plastic Energy first announced a collaboration to explore the construction of a commercial scale plant in 2020. The companies say Tacoil already has been successfully converted into virgin-quality polymer through the Ineos cracker in Köln, and has been “used by selected customers and brands to demonstrate the viability and demand for materials from advanced recycling.”