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Resource Recycling keeps you on top of critical industry trends and brings unparalleled analysis of the evolving materials stream, market turbulence, policy trends and more.

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How MRF technology made a contaminant a product

Published: March 12, 2024
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Rumpke’s new Columbus, Ohio MRF is key to a partnership with Eastman Chemical that will create an end market for opaque PET materials, among other hard-to-recycle products. | Courtesy of Rumpke

A partnership between midwest recycling processor Rumpke and resin giant Eastman Chemical will create an end market for opaque and otherwise hard-to-recycle PET materials, driven by state-of-the-art sortation capabilities at Rumpke’s Columbus, Ohio MRF.

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Zero Waste DC plan centers community, collaboration

Published: March 12, 2024
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Trucks at a landfill site from above.

The Zero Waste DC plan’s goal is to divert 80% of the city’s waste stream away from landfill and incineration by 2040. | Janossy Gergely/Shutterstock

The nation’s capital recently finalized a zero-waste plan nearly a decade in the making, one that ecompasses 43 actions such as composting mandates, extended producer responsibility for many materials and single-use plastic bans. Continue Reading

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Why Glacier’s MRF robots drew millions in funding

Published: March 12, 2024
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Robotics from Glacier can be made to fit any belt width and can target more than 30 distinct materials. | Courtesy of Glacier

The co-founders of emerging sortation robotics supplier Glacier say their robots provide an immediate quality benefit with a small footprint: They can be placed anywhere a manual sorter would be stationed. Continue Reading

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MRF battery fires burn ‘really fast’ and ‘really hot’

Published: March 5, 2024
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Vinod Singh of Far West Recycling speaks during an Association of Oregon Recyclers presentation on recycling facility battery fires in February. | Dan Holtmeyer/Resource Recycling

At a Portland, Oregon-area transfer station, site superintendent Matt Tracy has noticed smaller lithium-ion batteries often behave like fireworks when they go into thermal runaway: They move erratically and can even become projectiles. Continue Reading

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Top stories from February 2024

Published: March 5, 2024
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Fiber bales stacked for recycling.

Nick Peps/Shutterstock

Readers in February were drawn to coverage of an upcoming MRF with a mixed-waste line, as well as stories exploring export trends, producer responsbility organization movement, California’s definition of “recyclable,” and responses to a recent report criticizing plastics recycling.
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Electronics processor begins recycling robotics

Published: March 5, 2024
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Robotic sorting systems that have reached end of life are being processed by electronics recycling firm First America. | Courtesy of First America

Robotic sorting systems are increasingly making their way into MRFs and other recycling facilities, where they sort recyclables and even disassemble electronics. Now, they’re entering one electronics recycling company’s facilities as part of the end-of-life stream.
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