Fields Of Green

From his perspective as a leading recycler in one of North America’s largest cities, Al Metauro has seen a lot of recent changes in the way secondary commodities are collected, processed and sold to consuming markets.

Al and his brother Anthony started in the business in the Toronto area more than 25 years ago as collectors of old corrugated containers (OCC) and other recyclable paper grades, working from a pickup truck as their combination collection vehicle and mobile office.

Today, Metro Waste Paper Recovery Inc., based in Toronto, has 11 locations in Canada—as far west as Vancouver and as far east as Ottawa—and three plants in the United States (all in New York state).

The company is now affiliated with paper maker Cascades (See the January 2008 Recycling Today story, "Change as a Constant"), and handles more than 1 million metric tons per year of recyclable commodities—primarily paper, but also plastic and metal containers and other materials that stream into its plants.

In an interview with Recycling Today Editor in Chief Brian Taylor, Metauro provides his views on several challenges and opportunities facing recycling companies in the present and near future.

Al Metauro: Yes, most definitely. We are finding generators of waste being more diligent in ensuring they know what is being generated. Regardless of sector, generators are paying more attention to what’s going into their waste bins; sourcing recycling avenues for non-traditional materials, such as food waste and plastics; and investing in more efficient equipment. Generators are taking action to ensure that all possible measures are taken to reduce the volume and/or recover as much as possible for recycling.

AM: Over the years, Metro has recognized that in order to get the fiber, either primary or secondary, we have had to expand our services to include the recovery of a wider range of materials. For example, we introduced our trademarked Minimum Waste program in which our environmental engineering department conducts comprehensive facility assessments to ensure no recoverable materials are ending up in landfills. This department has the ability and expertise to analyze the entire waste stream and make concrete recommendations, with the ultimate goal of maximizing recovery. With more and more generators mandating "green" policies and implementing stricter operating procedures, our opportunity lies in providing our proven programs for greater recovery rates. This will yield more recyclable materials resulting from greater efforts by those who are already recycling and the addition of those who are just beginning to see the benefits.

AM: The increased value has complemented our efforts to recover more than paper for our customers. For the municipal sector, for example, higher prices and consistent demand is solidifying the sustainability of PET and HDPE collected through curbside recycling programs. This has resulted in opening the door to the collection of lesser value plastics combined with offsetting the cost with the additional revenue generated. For Metro’s IC&I (industrial, commercial and institutional) customers, plastics, mostly in the form of film, are being promoted as a viable, recoverable material.

AM: Over the years, we have minimized our challenges working with municipalities simply by understanding how each municipality is mandated to manage the waste generated by its residents and realizing that a major component of most mandates is to achieve the highest diversion rate of as many materials from the landfill or incinerator. It also requires recognizing the fact that each municipality may differ as a result of the programs they offer and the method they choose to collect at the curb. The bottom line is you have to deal with what is delivered to your facility for processing and must design each facility accordingly. We have realized continued success by customizing each facility design to recover the materials included in each of the municipal programs in a way that achieves maximum recovery of each material while ensuring the highest market value for each material is realized.

AM: The expansion of curbside programs over the years that has allowed conventional curbside materials to be collected in one single stream has presented processors with new challenges. What was once a simple process of hand picking to sort materials is now a complex web of conveyor belts and mechanical equipment. Even with the latest technology, quality remains our greatest challenge—in particular, meeting the standards for No. 8 newsprint.

As I indicated earlier, municipalities are limited to what they can change at the curb or how they collect material. As a processor, we have no control over this; we need to accept these restrictions. This leaves us with basically two options in how the fiber is recovered from single-stream programs.

The first option is for us to produce mixed paper and sell it at a lower price. The second, more viable option is we meet the quality standard expected by the end market for No. 8 news.

Quality control measures are constantly in place on all of our lines to ensure the standard is being met, however, it’s virtually impossible to consistently meet the standard for No. 8 news, regardless of the number of manual sorters we add.

Fortunately, technology is advancing, and having already installed optical sorting at other facilities, we now have the experience of understanding how this technology works.

We’ve applied this state-of-the-art technology to address the quality issues presented on our quality control line, specifically, after the No. 8 news has been separated from the container stream.

By doing so, the contaminants in the news stream (mostly containers and LDPE) as well as the non-news fiber are now being removed by the optical sorters. Today, the quality of our No. 8 news is well in line with the mills’ requirements.

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AM: This will have a tremendous impact on the economics of recycling. Particularly at this time when the "green movement" is so prevalent and more materials are being collected. The domestic users will enjoy the availability at preferred prices but the recycling industry will lose revenues as markets decrease and prices fall. On the other hand, if "green" remains the trend, the industry may have to charge for the service to make up for lost revenues. As for markets, it may take some time, but I’m certain someone will find a way to use these lower-cost materials.

AM: My belief is there is always opportunity in the recycling business. With so many new products being added to the list, many small start-ups are currently underway. It may prove more difficult to grow if the focus is on the conventional materials like paper and paper packaging products or residential materials. With well-established companies providing services at every generation level, the competition is definitely strong.

My brother Anthony and I just happened to enter the business in 1979 just before recycling became popular and paper grades were just being recognized as a major contributor to the waste stream. The fact that recovered paper has become a major commodity over the years suggests the process works. The question remains: Will some of the new add-ons realize the potential that paper has?