Good Questions From a Conscientious Recycler

This question came to us recently from a Eureka resident. I think these same questions are on the mind of many conscientious recyclers.

“Just curious; I've noticed, checking the home recycling bins in Eureka, that a lot of people are throwing stuff in with the paper and plastic that isn't recyclable. For example, after the earthquake I saw where one lady threw broken window glass in with the containers. I also see a lot of packaging used for frozen foods routinely thrown in along with milk cartons and such.

I also notice one household routinely throws in food containers like peanut butter jars and salad dressing containers without washing them out first.

How bad a problem is the trash mixed in with recyclables? Would you be able to give a percentage of trash received vs. recyclables?

How much a problem are the dirty food containers?

Just wondering, [I figure] that if it gets too out of hand you're also gonna have to charge more for recycling because you'll be having to get rid of so much trash.”

Thank you conscientious recycler… here are detailed answers for you:

Thank You for paying attention, and being concerned about proper recycling. You are absolutely right, items such as tempered glass (window pane), frozen food containers (which have a wet strength coating that inhibits recyclability), and milk cartons (which have a wax coating which also inhibits recyclability) are not recyclable and therefore are considered trash in Eureka’s system. The appropriate placement for these items once discarded is the trash can – where the ultimate destination is the landfill not the recycling factory. The reality is not all containers and packagings are recyclable. It can be very confusing for people because certain labels on packaging can be misleading. For example, most people have come to recognize the triangular chasing arrows symbol to be equated with recyclability. There are several variations on the chasing arrows that actually have many meanings depending on the way it is depicted. The plastic industry uses the chasing arrows with a resin identifier code (usually a number) in the center of the loop; it does not mean the item is recyclable. Styrofoam is an excellent example of this. It can often be found marked with the resin ID code (the chasing arrows) and the #6 in the center; as a consequence the community is lead to believe Styrofoam is recyclable, unfortunately in our region it is not.

With that, let me answer your question about the problem of trash contamination in the recyclable stream. There are two major considerations, people and money. All of the recyclable material picked up at Eureka curb-side is brought to our processing facility in Samoa for sorting, baling and shipping. The recyclable material is sorted by machinery and people. With the dual stream system the material is spread onto two separate conveyor belts, paper and containers. The paper fibers are sorted by material (cardboard, newspaper/magazines, office pack) entirely by hand. It takes additional time for the sort line personnel to have to constantly pull non-recyclable papers (trash) from this line such as milk cartons and wet strength cardboard packaging. I realize this may be hard to visualize. The conveyor belt is moving at a fairly fast clip; anytime attention is pulled away to remove trash there is the potential to miss quality recyclables. We have begun to market an additional paper grade – a super mixed paper – to help mitigate this situation. Because of the substantial mixed content we have to sell it at a much reduced cost. The situation on the container line is a bit different. It contains tumblers and magnets that assist with the sorting but ultimately it requires people to sort plastic by type and glass by color. It is on the container side that we find the majority of the trash. We have three staff positions dedicated to trash removal before the material is sent through the mechanical system, one at the bottom of the conveyor belt and two at the top in an area affectionately referred to as the “Trash Shack”. This is where the Styrofoam is pulled out… big wheels, Christmas lights… I think you get the idea. The final stage of the container system also supports a receptacle for missed trash. So far I have only mentioned material that residents may have misunderstood to be recyclable. Unfortunately, we also receive items that are banned by law for disposal in either the trash or recycling: sharps (needles), biohazard materials, toxic chemicals (pesticides, corrosive cleaners). These materials pose a significant hazard to sort line staff and therefore we have strict protocols in place for safely removing and containing these hazards. Each time a hazardous material is spotted the sort line shuts down. On some days this down time can be up to 20% of the work day – this represents a huge additional cost through loss of productivity and added fees for safe disposal of the hazardous materials.

On to the numbers…. For the last quarter of 2009, we had an average residual rate (percentage of tonnage processed that was not recycled) of 3.78% (85.52 out of 2,264.68 tons). December was a particularly high month with 37.99 tons of residual trash representing 5.1% of our processed volume. At the Humboldt Waste Management Authority’s tip rate of $155.56/ton, this translates to an additional cost of $5909.72 for ACRC to dispose of trash in December alone. Pretty appalling.
You also asked about dirty food containers. Washing a container before it is recycled through ACRC is not necessary. However, thoroughly scraping it of any food debris is. As I mentioned above containers are sorted partially by machinery where heavy items are separated from lighter ones. For this step in the process to work plastics need to behave like lightweight material. If, for example, a plastic jar with a few tablespoons of peanut butter left inside is sent through the container sort line it will behave more like glass, be segregated to the glass line where, because it is not glass, it will be fed to the “trash” conveyor belt and ultimately landfilled. The same effect is seen with water bottles that have not been emptied and so on. Naturally, we are also interested in not attracting vermin, either to the processing facility or residents’ recycling carts.

We anticipate a certain amount of trash to come through the system. It would be unrealistic not to. However, we need to continue to educate the community to keep trash contamination out of the recycling stream. I appreciate your help with this! I would like to invite you to come see the process in Samoa.