The Raleigh (West Virginia) County Solid Waste Authority is setting a difficult goal for itself: to create a recycling center that can operate in the black.
Authority officials broke ground about a month ago for a 24,000-square-foot facility they hope will become a major regional recycling hub. The key to making such an operation financially successful will be volume, Executive Director Bill Patton said.
To that end, the authority is reaching out to nearby municipal and county leaders to encourage them to send their mandated curbside recyclables to Raleigh County for processing.
Sally Shepherd, executive director of the Kanawha County Solid Waste Authority, said she supports the idea. Sending Kanawha County collections to Raleigh County would let her approach schools and offices that do not currently recycle their paper, plastics and metals, and give her the space to accommodate their materials.
Patton hopes to secure the curbside recyclables from area cities and counties as a base source of material. That could add up to about 6,000 tons per year.
But once the operation is on its feet, Patton hopes to expand by providing pick-up points at schools, unincorporated areas and other potential sources. He expects that by doing that, the Raleigh County authority can take in as much 10,000 tons per year and cover its own costs without the assistance of state subsidies. He estimates it would take about 3 to 5 years to get to that point.
“I see no reason why it won’t work,” Patton said. “Most centers have to be subsidized to a level that is unreasonable, but we’re going to try to get enough volume to break even.”
The Raleigh County authority has cash in hand to pay the $1.5 million budgeted for the facility’s construction and automated equipment.
The authority operates a landfill in addition to its current recycling center, and it collects about $41 for each ton of trash commercial haulers dump at its site. After handing a portion over to the state, it keeps nearly $33 of that for itself and has accumulated enough money to pay for the new venture.
“We’ll be at an advantage since we won’t have a debt load when we begin operating,” Patton said.
Eventually, Patton hopes the facility will collect enough recyclable material to attract a private company to set up on site as an “end user” to make a usable product and help stabilize costs.