Recyclers based in or trading with the Middle East region will have the opportunity to gather in early December 2016 at the Recycling CONFEX Middle East event in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. The CONFEX is being held Dec. 4-5 at the Hyatt Regency Dubai & Galleria.

The new event is being organized by Media Fusion Inc., publisher of Waste & Recycling Middle East magazine and other regional periodicals, along with the Recycling Today Media Group. “By combining the best attributes of a Conference and an exhibition, the CONFEX delivers unique value in the form of industry insight, networking and a look at technology and machinery,” says Dr. Kayyum Ali, CEO of Media Fusion.

Media Fusion says the event is being designed to provide “comprehensive recycling market insight to industry professionals, waste management professionals, the government sector, environmentalists and other interested parties.”

CONFEX Middle East builds upon a series of previous recycling conferences co-organized by Waste & Recycling Middle East magazine and the Recycling Today Media Group from 2012 through 2014. The Paper & Plastics Recycling Conference Middle East events and the Middle East Metals Recycling Conferences provided regional and global market insight to delegates from throughout the MENA (Middle East and North Africa) region and beyond.

Programming at the CONFEX is being planned to provide updates in several recycling sectors, including ferrous and nonferrous scrap, paper, plastics, end-of-life vehicles and obsolete electronics. Equipment makers and service providers will have the opportunity to host displays in an exhibit hall.

More information on the event will be hosted on the Web at www.waste-recyclingme.ae as it becomes available.

MillerCoors, with corporate headquarters in Chicago, has announced all of its major breweries are now landfill-free, with the Fort Worth Brewery in Texas as the latest site to reach this milestone. MillerCoors says it has remained an industry leader in waste reduction since its first brewery reached landfill-free status in 2011 by leveraging key learnings and the passion of its people to brew beer more sustainably.

“We are committed to finding innovative ways to build on our heritage of brewing high-quality beer sustainably. It is one of our driving priorities in creating America’s best beer company,” says Gavin Hattersley, MillerCoors CEO. “We didn’t reach this milestone overnight nor can we attribute success to one department, one brewery or one employee. The entire MillerCoors family is committed to ensuring a sustainable future for our company and the communities in which we work and live.”

MillerCoors Fort Worth Brewery in Texas reduced waste by 66 percent in 2015 compared to 2014. The brewery engaged a Sustainability Employee Council to lead education initiatives throughout the facility, focusing on changing employee behaviors by making recycling easier and more accessible. Nearly 100 percent of brewery waste is recycled or reused, with the small amount of remaining waste going to a waste-to-energy facility, a best practice across MillerCoors.

The brewer’s journey to landfill-free operations began in 2009, when the company set a goal to reduce brewery waste by 15 percent by 2015. MillerCoors’ Trenton, Ohio, Brewery was its first landfill-free location. Trenton’s best practices have provided the foundation for implementing landfill-free processes throughout MillerCoors other major breweries. Since 2009, MillerCoors has reduced its waste across the organization by 89 percent, equal to keeping more than 9 million pounds of waste out of local landfills.

“As we continue our journey to brew a sustainable future, maintaining landfill-free operations at all our major breweries will make a significant impact,” says Kim Marotta, MillerCoors director of sustainability. “While we continuously strive to reduce waste, we will also remain focused on our other sustainability priorities, including preventing drunk driving, further decreasing our water use, lowering our carbon emissions, and making greater investment in our people and our communities.”

Achieving landfill-free operations at all major breweries is not the end of MillerCoors commitment to waste reduction. By 2020, the brewer aims to achieve landfill-free operations at all its major manufacturing sites in the U.S. 

More information on MillerCoors’ waste reduction efforts and details on its sustainability strategy and 2020 goals, are available www.millercoors.com/sustainability.

In an interview with the Recycling Today Media Group’s Kristin Smith during the 2015 Renewable Energy from Waste Conference, Audrey Templeton, corporate environmental manager for MillerCoors, discusses several acheivements the brewing company has made in its efforts to reduce waste.

As manufacturers continue to seek out the most advanced material innovations to promote lightweight structures, West Midlands, U.K.-based ELG Carbon Fibre Ltd., a leading supplier of carbon fibre products, has responded with the introduction of its Carbiso™ range. At JEC World 2016, ELG Carbon Fibre will be showcasing this line of recycled carbon fibre products, which it says offers a cost-effective solution to traditional composites in high volume applications.

From a dedicated recovery plant in the West Midlands, ELG Carbon Fibre reclaims carbon fibre from manufacturing and end-of-life material. The carbon fibre is then converted into products for the composites and compounding industry.

At JEC World 2016, ELG Carbon Fibre will focus predominately on its range of Carbiso M and Carbiso TM isotropic mats. These easy-to-handle, drapeable mats are compatible with most thermoset and thermoplastic polymers and deliver excellent mechanical properties, according to the company.

Carbiso M mats are produced from 100% recycled carbon fibre and can be processed by conventional composite techniques to manufacture structural and semistructural parts, ELG Carbon Fibre says. Carbiso TM products are hybrid mats produced from recycled fibres and comingled with thermoplastic matrixes for press moulding applications.

Both Carbiso M and TM mats are available in standard 150 to 500 grams per square metre weights and 2.7-metre widths. They also can be manufactured to bespoke specifications.

The introduction of these new products at JEC World 2016 proceeds a very successful growth period for ELG Carbon Fibre, the company says. Since the organisation became part of the globally successful ELG Haniel Group in 2011, the company has consistently doubled its output each year, culminating in the reclamation of over 1000 tonnes of finished carbon fibre in 2015, which was converted into a wide range of products predominately for the oil and gas and transportation industries.

ELG Carbon Fibre’s will be in Hall 5A/Stand L34 at JEC World 2016 in Paris from the 8-10 March, 2016.

Frazer Barnes, managing director of ELG Carbon Fibre Ltd., and Detlef Drafz, CEO of ELG Haniel GmbH, will conduct media interviews throughout the show.

Frazer also will host a technical sales presentation at 4 p.m. Wednesday, 9 March, titled “Recycled Carbon Fibres: A New Approach to Cost Effective, Lightweight Structures.” All visitors are welcome to attend and no preregistration is necessary.

Battery Solutions, with corporate headquarters in Howell, Michigan, and Call2Recycle Inc., a battery stewardship organization based in Atlanta, have announced today that they have entered into a partnership through which Battery Solutions will sort batteries collected at Call2Recycle sites across the United States.

“The single biggest opportunity to improve the efficiency of managing waste batteries is by partnering with the leader in sorting technologies,” says Carl Smith, CEO and president of Call2Recycle. “We went through an extensive evaluation process scrutinizing industrywide proposals and selected Battery Solutions as part of our service provider network as we share the same vision of expanding battery recycling while exceeding the highest industry standards for efficiency.”

“It is a natural step for Call2Recycle and Battery Solutions to join forces as we are both industry leading organizations,” says Thomas Bjarnemark, CEO of Battery Solutions. “We are excited to add the estimated 7 million pounds of batteries Call2Recycle anticipates collecting in 2016.”

Call2Recycle’s battery volume will add to the 40 million pounds of batteries Battery Solutions collects annually for recycling. With a nationwide footprint, the company recently added automated sorting technology to sort batteries by chemistry for safe and efficient recycling.

Call2Recycle and Battery Solutions say their processes are fully integrated and full collection containers from Call2Recycle’s collection network have already begun to be sorted by Battery Solutions’ locations in Howell and in and Mesa, Arizona.

Battery Solutions offers end-to-end life cycle management and customized recycling solutions for all battery chemistries throughout North America. The company’s services include environmental and regulatory compliance, documentation, safety, logistics, reporting and the conversion of materials into the highest economic value.

Call2Recycle operates across the U.S. and Canada. Its battery recycling program, Call2Recycle, is the oldest and largest consumer battery stewardship program. Collecting and recycling batteries for retailers, municipalities, businesses and consumers through its network of nearly 30,000 collection sites, more than 100 million pounds (45 million kilograms) of batteries and cellphones have been diverted from the solid waste stream.