A new satellite office will allow Ingram Micro ITAD to better serve Pacific Northwest customers with IT asset disposition and on-site data destruction services, according to a press release. Ingram Micro ITAD (formerly called CloudBlue) opened an office in Auburn, Wash., in the Seattle-Tacoma metropolitan area. The company provides enterprise IT asset disposition (ITAD), life cycle support services, on-site data...

Lower prices for recovered polyethylene films have helped drive higher profits for composite lumber product manufacturer Trex. The publicly traded company, which consumes post-consumer PE film for use in outdoor building products, reported sales of $140 million during the quarter, up 32 percent year over year. The company's net income totalled $20 million, up from nearly $8 million during the...

Global consumer goods company Procter & Gamble used 34,400 metric tons of post-consumer plastic during the 2016-17 fiscal year, bringing it nearly one-third of the way to its 2020 goal. The Cincinnati-headquartered company aims to double its use of post-consumer resin (PCR) between 2010 and 2020. In 2010, it used about 26,071 tons of PCR, so its goal is to...

This story has been updated. Three organizations are pushing to have their packaging types accepted at MRFs, but six nonprofit recycling groups are pushing back. The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries' (ISRI) MRF Council was scheduled to hear presentations this morning (Nov. 7) from Keurig Green Mountain, the Foodservice Packaging Institute (FPI) and the Hefty EnergyBag Program. They were expected...

In the quest to generate higher-quality end products, Penn Waste turned to a number of equipment advancements. The York, Pa.-based company recently opened a revamped MRF incorporating additional optical sorters and a robotic sorting system that uses artificial intelligence to identify objects. Bulk Handling Systems provided the equipment for the single-stream MRF. The $3.5 million in upgrades help the company...

Republic Services reported higher recycling revenues during the third quarter, and it expects its acquisition of MRF operator ReCommunity will boost tonnages it processes by about half going forward. According to Republic's quarterly filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the second-largest garbage and recycling company in North America acquired all of ReCommunity's shares for $165 million, net of...

Two plastics equipment companies recently held a demonstration of what they call the world's first inline system converting washed PET flakes into bottle pre-forms. Recycling equipment specialist Erema and PET packaging company SIPA collaborated to create the inline PET pre-form system, according to an Erema press release. The system, which allows for 100 percent rPET use in bottle pre-forms, reduces...

In Europe, thermoform packaging is using more and more RPET content, but impediments remain to efficient recycling of the thermoforms themselves. A workshop recently discussed the issues. Trade group Petcore Europe reported on the results of a September workshop that provided updates to stakeholders on efforts to boost thermoform recycling. The event was held by PetCore's Thermoforms Working Group, which...

For years, a European Union panel has given its thumbs up to using recycling processes to generate food-contact recycled plastics, but those opinions aren't official government "approvals." Some groups say the lack of official authorization from the European Commission has lead to damaging uncertainty for the industry. "This uncertainty leads to decline in investments and more importantly to a possible...

A new technology makes it possible for a ship to scoop up ocean plastics, convert them to diesel and use the fuel to power the ship on the same voyage. EcoFuel technologies' (EFT) portable plastics-to-fuel technology can create about a gallon of diesel from 10 pounds of plastic. Optimum feedstocks are polyethylene, polypropylene and polystyrene. The process will accommodate other...