With an air pollution permit in place for a New York operation, a U.K.-based CRT glass recycling firm says it’s bringing its smelting technology to the U.S.
Representatives from Nulife Glass, led by Simon Greer, informed E-Scrap News earlier this week the company has received final approval from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation to build and operate a leaded glass smelting furnace at a facility in Dunkirk, New York.
That furnace, which has been in operation in the U.K., will be Nulife’s first in the U.S. and the company says it has plans to expand beyond New York.
“Nulife Glass is presently in negotiations for additional sites for processing and melting glass in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Ohio,” Greer told E-Scrap News. “The only restriction on Nulife’s processing capacity will be the speed at which it can open new sites and that is only restricted by the rate at which suppliers can deliver glass.”
As for supplying the site in New York, Greer said, “Key stakeholders in the supply chain managed, controlled and audited by the manufacturers, government and inspection organizations” have indicated they will have ample glass to get the Nulife operation going. The company website suggests the furnace “will have the capacity to process more than 200 million pounds [100,000 tons] of CRT glass.” The site does not say whether that figure is an annual capacity.
Any additional processing capacity would provide help for firms looking for CRT recycling outlets. While estimates vary widely, somewhere between 200,000 and 400,000 tons of glass enters the U.S. waste stream each year while actual maximum processing capacity, including international options, hovers around 200,000 tons.