A Painting Partnership

MetroPaint, a recycling and retail program of the Portland, Ore., region’s Metro government, has partnered with King County’s (Washington) LinkUp Program.

The goal of LinkUp is to increase the use of recycled and reusable materials in consumer products throughout the Puget Sound region.

MetroPaint will work with LinkUp to begin collecting and selling its 100-percent recycled paint in King County.

MetroPaint is one of the only operations in the Northwest that is recycling latex paint and making a recycled latex paint product, according to a press release from the King County Department of Natural Resources and Parks. It has been recycling paint since 1992 when household hazardous waste collection was started in the Portland area. Latex paint made up 40 percent of what was collected. Today, MetroPaint takes in 252,000 gallons of paint each year and manufactures about 21,000 gallons of 100-percent recycled paint each month.

The paint used in MetroPaint’s product is collected from household hazardous waste programs in Oregon and Washington. The recycled paint is filtered to industry standards and tested for performance and environmental safety.

LinkUp works with MetroPaint and other manufacturers to help increase the use of recycled materials in the manufacturing process and to increase King County area markets for recycled content products. Businesses in the LinkUp program use recycled materials in the products they make or process certain types of recyclable materials for use by others in the Puget Sound area.

In recent months, LinkUp has worked to expand its reach beyond private businesses. The partnership with MetroPaint marks the program’s first collaboration with another government entity.

LinkUp was launched in 2000 and is sponsored by the King County Solid Waste Division. The program currently has 22 partners working with all types of recycled materials from glass, to textiles to food.