Colin Staub is a reporter at Resource Recycling. He can be contacted at [email protected].
Oregon’s bottle bill, the oldest in the nation, could see some changes. | Veja/Shutterstock
Oregon state lawmakers recently approved a bill that allows the state to designate new redemption centers in Portland tailored toward canners — people who redeem containers on a daily or near-daily basis — and to allow retailers operating nearby to provide fewer redemption services. Continue Reading
PepsiCo will now shoot for 40% global recycled plastic use by 2035, instead of 50% by 2030. | FotograFFF/Shutterstock
Citing factors outside the company’s control, brand giant PepsiCo has softened its global post-consumer recycled content target and given itself more time to achieve the goal. Continue Reading
A judge favored Brightmark’s parent company over a slightly higher bid, preferring Brightmark’s plan to keep the facility operating over the competing bid’s liquidation plan. | Photo courtesy of Brightmark
Brightmark’s bankrupt Indiana pyrolysis facility has been sold to parent company Brightmark for $14.3 million in a move that will keep the facility operating and retain most or all of its more than 100 employees, a judge ruled this month. The latest development came after a competitive auction process with plenty of twists and turns.
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A technology-focused panel at ReMA’s 2025 conference featured Blake Gordon of Georgia-Pacific Recycling, Lisa Kagan of Buddy and Geoff Aardsma of AMCS, and was moderated by Jennifer Betts of Magnar Metals. | Photo by Colin Staub / Resource Recycling
For Blake Gordon, general manager of digital trading at Georgia-Pacific Recycling, defining next-generation technology can be boiled down to a simple question: Does it simplify something that is unnecessarily complex? If so, it’s next-gen. Continue Reading
Recycled material-focused software platform Replenysh allows end users to have greater visibility into their sourcing. | Photo courtesy M13
Replenysh, a company providing software that connects recycled material generators with processors and end users, has raised $8 million in capital for expansion as it aims to fix what a company leader calls a “trust gap” in the U.S. recycling system.
Eric Frederickson, vice president of operations at Call2Recycle, presented a battery burn demonstration alongside the San Diego Fire-Rescue Department. | Colin Staub/E-Scrap News
After a year that recorded a notable increase in e-scrap facility battery fires, the growing hazard and ways of mitigating it received ample attention at the Recycled Materials Association’s annual conference in San Diego last week.
Napa Recycling will begin collecting glass separate from other single-stream recyclables at restaurants and other businesses, in a pilot project aimed at increasing the quality and value of its marketed glass. | Photo courtesy Napa Recycling
A pot of money created when California added wine and spirits bottles into its container redemption program is being used to fund glass recycling pilot projects, including a commercial collection program in the heart of wine country.
The safety-focused summit came after the latest federal data showed a backslide in waste and recycling industry safety. | M2020/Shutterstock
As recycling companies seek to improve workplace safety amid an industry-wide increase in on-the-job fatalities, experts at a recent industry summit advised managers to focus their attention on — and for top executives, even to attend — the regular pre-shift safety meetings.
A secondary sorting facility pulling deposit containers out of mixed plastic bales was awarded funding from the state of California. | Hiv360/Shutterstock
California’s state recycling agency will provide $10 million toward a facility sorting plastics with resin codes 2-7, additional multimillion dollar grants for several major MRF retrofits, and a handful of smaller awards for localities to install recycling collection containers. Continue Reading
Extended producer responsibility was a hot topic throughout the three-day event held in Seattle last week. | Photo Courtesy of GreenBlue Org
A common complaint among MRF operators is that they have little meaningful contact with the packaging industry, despite dealing with headaches from that industry’s products every single day. Continue Reading