This article appeared in the August 2024 issue of Resource Recycling. Subscribe today for access to all print content.

Despite lagging federal data on recycling, collections genuinely appear to have hit a ceiling across the U.S., several leaders in the recycling industry said in recent months.

When George Smilow, chief operating officer at New York-based PQ Recycling, started his career back in the 1970s, “I believe there were about 50 to 60 PET reclaimers in North America, and the return rate was 30%,” he said during Resource Recycling’s Plastics Recycling Conference in March. “Today there are about half, and the return rate is about 27%.”

AMP founder and CEO Matanya Horowitz echoed the sentiment during a July webinar on the company’s advancements in integrating AI into MRFs to capture material more efficiently.

“Despite all the innovations and technology, despite all the investment, despite all the effort of operators and different stakeholders in the industry, recycling rates have been stagnant for about 15 years here in the United States,” AMP founder and CEO Matanya Horowitz said during a July webinar on the company’s advancements in AI and robotics, for example.

“It’s unfortunate when you have broader macro trends that should be supportive of the recycling industry,” such as broad interest in society’s natural resource usage, Horowitz added.

The current stagnation followed a multi-decade runup in the U.S. recycling rate, which slowed to a halt around 2010. The nation has struggled to hit 35% since then. U.S. EPA data for 2015 show a 34.7% recycling and composting rate, nearly the same as 2014, which clocked in at 34.6%. In 2017, the rate broke 35%, but just barely. Then in 2018, the rate dropped to 32%, though the drop was partially due to a change in how the rate was calculated.

The agency hasn’t updated its once-annual U.S. Facts and Figures diversion report in nearly four years. An emailed statement said one of the biggest challenges is that data collected from states and territories isn’t standardized: “If EPA had a magic wand, we would use it to collect a uniform and comprehensive waste dataset from every state and territory.”

Looking at other data, The Recycling Partnership estimated that the recycling rate of residential recyclables is 21%, which it noted is lower than past estimates due to the inclusion of film and flexibles.

Plastic specifically also saw a decline in recycling in 2022 compared to the year before, according to the 2022 U.S. Post-consumer Plastic Recycling Data Dashboard, which was prepared by Stina Inc. and released by the Recycled Materials Association, the U.S. Plastics Pact and the Association of Plastic Recyclers (APR owns the publisher of this magazine). About 5 billion pounds of post-consumer plastic were recovered in 2022, a drop of 71 million pounds, or about 1.4%, from 2021. In 2021, that dashboard showed an increase of 285 million pounds over the prior year.

Single-stream sets the stage for volume growth

Setting aside the data disparities and measurement methodologies, a straightforward narrative helps explain the last three decades in recycling diversion trends, said Brent Bell, vice president of recycling for WM, the nation’s largest hauler. The rapid growth in recycling collection and diversion rate during the 1990s and 2000s ties to both the start-up of many curbside recycling programs and a nationwide shift from dual-stream and towards single-stream. The ease of all-in-one-cart recycling meant residents could simply send more materials into the recycling stream.

“That’s when you saw more single-stream programs start to take off, and along with that, throughout that time, people got rid of their little 18-gallon toters that were basically just designed to collect newspaper and have a few bottles and cans on top of it, to the actual 64- plus, 96-gallon carts,” Bell said. “I think that’s when you saw the big convenience factor get pushed in with single-stream, saying, ‘Hey, put it all into one bin: Bottles, cans, paper, cardboard, we’ll collect it all.’”

When the municipalities WM serviced would convert from dual- to single-stream recycling, Bell said the company saw an average 40% increase in the materials it collected in those programs.

Additionally, recycling programs were adding in materials that carried a lot of weight: Glass was a huge portion of the recycling stream in the 1990s. Far more beverages were bottled in glass rather than plastic, more cosmetic products came in glass packaging, and glass was one of the largest material streams WM’s recycling operations handled. WM itself actually operated glass recycling plants in that era, Bell noted.

As these changes unfolded, the national recycling and composting rate grew from 16% in 1990, when 33.2 million tons were recycled or composted, up to 28.5% in 2000, when 69.5 million tons were recycled or composted, according to EPA figures. Diversion further increased to 31.4% in 2005 and 34% in 2010.

Material trends converge, plateauing growth

Then the increase stalled. By 2015, although recycling volume had ticked up to 91 million tons, the rate sat at 34.7%, and there was little change until 2018, when volume was flat but the rate declined due to a change in data methodology. What happened?

Bell says there were several concurrent trends that played into that stagnation. One component was the decline of a huge portion of the recycling stream, newsprint, as consumers increasingly turned to online news, which temporarily reduced the volume of fiber coming into the recycling stream. Newspaper recycling fell by half from 9.36 million tons in 2005 down to 4.79 million tons by 2015.

“We were all sitting there like, ‘Wow, what’s going to replace newspaper?’” Bell recalled. At the time, e-commerce was on the rise, and recycling stakeholders wondered if fiber recycling was on a permanent downward slide as the world went digital.

Of course, e-commerce required packaging, and a new trend for fiber recycling was born. Corrugated boxes drove up the percentage of OCC in the recycling stream, providing a replacement for the loss of newspaper. Corrugated box recycling increased from 22.1 million tons in 2005 up to 28.9 million tons in 2015, more than making up for the newspaper decrease during that period.

Separately, Bell pointed to the emergence of lightweighting across packaging streams.

“Whether it’s your aluminum can, your plastic bottle, even your cardboard, we saw this massive lightweighting come into place,” Bell said. WM calculated that with PET bottles, the company had to collect 1 million bottles to get the same weight of material it used to get by collecting 600,000 bottles pre-lightweighting.

Finally, the decade between 2010 and 2020 brought a massive recycling industry disruption — one that was arguably directly connected to the factors that brought such a rise in recycling tonnage and rate. Unpacking this disruption, its cause and its effect on recycling volumes requires a brief reminder of the recycling markets of the 2000s and early 2010s.

Market upheaval spurs upstream quality focus

The rapid growth of U.S. recycling tonnages required buyers for those collected materials, and for years, the Chinese market was far and away the primary buyer for the paper and plastic streams.

In 2013, for example, the U.S. recycled 43.4 million short tons of paper and paperboard, according to the EPA figures. And that year, 14.7 million tons of that material was exported to China, or 34% of all fiber recovered in the U.S., according to the U.S. Census Bureau, which maintains export figures.

The plastics recycling sector was also reliant on China: In 2013, the U.S. collected 5.98 billion pounds of scrap plastic, and the country exported 2.22 billion pounds to China — 37% of all U.S.-generated scrap plastic.
That heavy reliance on a single export market meant any changes in that market would have an outsized impact on U.S. recycling. Beginning in 2013, such changes began to emerge as China announced its Green Fence operation, which was marked by heightened inspections of inbound loads of scrap materials. The effort was a response to high levels of contaminants discovered in imported loads of recyclables, and the government began enforcing previously lax regulations banning contaminated loads.

Four years later, China ramped up its focus on rejecting contaminated loads with the National Sword campaign, and it ultimately stopped allowing imports of virtually all scrap plastic and mixed paper. The Chinese government’s decision was tied to an unintended consequence of single-stream recycling: With greater convenience often comes greater contamination.

“We had contamination levels above 25%,” Bell recalls. “We had to go and really come out with education programs, try to make sure people are recycling the right items, that they’re cleaning up their stream, not putting a bunch of stuff in there.”

The Chinese government regulations forced a shift in thinking in U.S. recycling programs, marked by a need to focus on quality of recyclables, not just quantity of material collected.

“The industry kind of said, ‘Hey, let’s hold on with the growth, let’s clean this up first, and then let’s go back to how we can get more material in the bin, once it’s cleaner.’” Bell said.

Pushing beyond 34%

The EPA said in an emailed statement that it aims to update its “Facts & Figures about Materials, Waste and Recycling” report late this year, and is “in the process of revising our measurement methodology to improve future data and will publish an analysis of our findings.”

“One of the biggest challenges in producing national estimates is states have different reporting requirements and measurement practices,” the agency noted. “More consistent measurement methodologies are necessary to improve recycling system performance across the country. These more standardized metrics can then be used to create effective national goals and track progress.”

The extended producer responsibility laws for packaging that have passed in five states will certainly help with that. The EPA noted that the reporting requirements in those laws “should help improve the accuracy of the national recycling rate as EPA develops an approach that uses more of the states’ data.”

In the past, the EPA largely used data reported by industry, but that is also not uniform, and made it difficult to answer other questions, such as how much contamination is present in collected recycling.

“Given that the methodology varied by waste type depending on the data available, it is unclear how much ‘contamination’ was factored into past recycling rates,” the EPA said. “We are working to improve our measurement, including supporting state efforts to improve their measurement capabilities. One of the goals of our improved methodology is to account for contamination.”

In the absence of recent EPA diversion data, it’s difficult to say where the country sits now in terms of annual diversion. But even without the current numbers, several avenues to pursue additional diversion are clear.
States with deposit programs consistently have some of the highest recycling rates in the country for bottles and cans, according to the “50 States of Recycling” report from Eunomia and Ball Corporation and other data sources. A recent MIT study projected that a nationwide 10-cent deposit on PET beverage containers could more than triple their recycling rate.

There’s untapped potential in the multifamily recycling sector, as only 37% of U.S. multi-family households have recycling access, The Recycling Partnership reported early this year. Public space and commercial recycling availability lags behind household recycling access.

And there is broad room for improvement in certain material streams outside of the blue bin. In 2019, the U.S. generated 66.22 million tons of food waste, for example, and 74% of that material was either landfilled or disposed of via controlled combustion. There is a huge opportunity to increase the composting rate, which sat at 5% in 2019.

“Convenience, access and behavior changes are probably on the top of that list,” Bell said. “And then making sure that the brands are using material that can be recycled.”

WM itself has made technological inroads in food waste recovery. Bell pointed to the company’s San Leandro, California, “organics MRF,” a facility that separates garbage from the recycling stream and separates out organics for anaerobic digestion.

“If you’re trying to get off of that 30% recycling rate plateau, we absolutely have to go after organics and other types of material that’s currently destined for the landfill,” Bell said. “So I kind of look at it from a broader perspective, not to get too stuck on the EPA’s percentages — even though we look at them all — but to say, hey, what’s the best way to unlock more material that could be going to the landfill? And organics is the next big portion of that.”

This article appeared in the August 2024 issue of Resource Recycling. Subscribe today for access to all print content.

As executive director of the Tahoma Indian Center, a nonprofit serving Indigenous people in Tacoma, Washington, Colette August generally hasn’t had a positive impression of working with the city government. Some of its initiatives have been difficult for the nonprofit to participate in, she said, and city employees generally don’t take the time to visit the center, to speak with the people seeking its help with food or housing or other needs, and to understand the distinctions among the region’s tribes.

She has had a different experience, however, with Preston Peck, a senior sustainability analyst for the city. Peck oversees a community ambassador program that leans on trusted individuals among diverse communities to spread the word about the city’s utilities. Over the last two years or so, he has come to the Tahoma center and forged meaningful connections that have culminated in a $2 million, federally funded partnership, which includes the center and four other community-based organizations, to grow public understanding of recycling. It’s part of a nationwide, multicultural collaboration to reach groups that have long been neglected by messaging efforts or dismissed by the industry.

“They are people who will help break down those barriers, and they truly care about making sure our community is being served, is being heard,” August said of Peck and his colleagues. “One of the reasons for me to say yes is for me to have someone willing to listen to the concerns that we have.”

That’s precisely the purpose of the U.S. EPA Recycling Education and Outreach grants benefiting Tacoma and other locations across the country. The agency late last year announced 25 projects would receive a total of $33 million, which came from the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and put particular emphasis on underserved populations disproportionately burdened by environmental problems. Even more money went toward infrastructure and heavy equipment needs.

“These grants reflect the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to tackling environmental justice and the climate crisis,” the agency wrote in a press release at the time, calling the program the largest investment in recycling in 30 years. “These recycling grants will help tackle consumer confusion and outdated recycling infrastructure, the largest barriers to proper recycling.”

Diverse communities, diverse approaches

The multiyear projects, many of which are still in the early stages of hiring managers and putting out preliminary bids, vary widely in dollar amount, geographic area and tactics, according to factsheets provided by the EPA and several participants. Tacoma, for example, will grow the community ambassador program while also using artificial intelligence on collection trucks to flag contamination and send direct feedback in the mail, Peck said.

Projects range in size from a $370,000 plan to build household and neighborhood composting programs in Pittsburgh to $2 million ad campaigns in the Chicago area, Virginia and eastern Oklahoma, among others. Recipients stretch from Maine, where the nonprofit recycling processor Ecomaine is working to reach multifamily residents, to the Big Island, where Recycle Hawai’i plans to train several cohorts of educators who will carry out their own education initiatives.

“This is an area where there is room for significant improvement, there’s a high ceiling that hasn’t been hit,” said Jamie Garvin, director of communications and public affairs for Ecomaine, referring to multifamily recycling. Multifamily properties tend to skew toward low-income, more diverse groups, he added, and the project will create toolkits for property managers and residents to help increase recycling participation from both directions.

“Even well-intentioned residents that might be motivated to do recycling don’t have the same access” compared to single-family neighborhoods, Garvin said. “That’s where we see opportunity to sort of level the field.”

Across the board, the projects aim to build existing initiatives to new heights, such as supporting New York City’s expansion of its curbside composting collection or building new exhibits at EdVenture Children’s Museum in South Carolina — featuring dinosaurs made of recycled materials, of course. The Oregon Community Warehouse, a Portland nonprofit that collects donated furniture and other home goods for refugees, formerly homeless families and others in need, is receiving $1.6 million as it expands to a third “furniture bank” location, said Phil Gerigscott, the group’s communications manager.

“We know there’s more than enough furniture in our community, it’s just a lack of awareness that we exist,” he said.

Past outreach was almost entirely word-of-mouth because of limited resources, so the money will help bring in a few more staff members and contractors, update the center’s website and develop culturally specific ads to reach potential donors in multiple languages, Gerigscott said. After English, Portland’s most common tongues include Spanish, Chinese, Vietnamese, Russian, Ukrainian, Korean and Arabic.

“We’re breaking down our constituent groups and figuring out who we’re already reaching and who we’re not reaching,” he said. “Even if they have heard of us, what are some potential barriers that are keeping them from donating?”

Gerigscott’s comments highlighted common threads throughout the 25 projects, including meeting residents of all backgrounds where they are, incorporating their particular backgrounds and replacing program administrators’ assumptions or ignorance with real knowledge.

Project leaders spoke of holding in-language gatherings at convenient and familiar locations rather than at City Hall, providing culturally appropriate meals so families can attend, and generally setting the scene for candid dialog. They also often used the term transcreation, in contrast to translation. Rather than converting a flier word-for-word from English to Spanish, transcreation would take a collaborative approach that might adapt the flier into an ad on a popular Spanish-speaking radio station, for example, or create a new flier with phrasing, images and other details that are familiar to the intended audience.

“A lot of times we talk at people,” rather than talking to or with them, said Will DiCostanzo, waste diversion coordinator for the city of Lincoln, Nebraska. The city’s focusing its $1.7 million grant on low-income and minority residents, including the city’s refugee population, as well as University of Nebraska-Lincoln students.

“You could always think of income as a barrier, because you have to pay for recycling here, which is a very obvious barrier that we have. But is it the only one?” DiCostanzo mused. “What do we need to know before we then create education that will motivate people to do the right thing with their waste?” The project aims to answer those questions.

A widespread need

The need for multi-channel, multicultural education reaches far beyond the 25 grant recipients, and it’s only growing clearer as the U.S. becomes more diverse and the country’s recycling activity stagnates.

In surveys across the country, Black and Latino respondents are more likely than their white counterparts to cite lack of access, lack of knowledge, perceived costs and social pressures as barriers that keep them from recycling, for example, according to The Recycling Partnership’s Equitable Outreach Guide. Asian, Pacific Islander and Indigenous respondents felt the same obstacles, though somewhat less intensely.

“If residents haven’t been given what they need to be successful, then it’s unrealistic to expect low contamination and high recycling,” said Michelle Metzler, TRP’s director of community programs. “That’s up to us as industry leaders and program administrators.”

Amelia Kovacs, sustainability programs manager with Walking Mountains Science Center in Eagle County, Colorado, said the nonprofit’s $570,000 grant will help recruit and train recycling advocates among the local Latino community.

While Spanish-speaking residents have often been left out of environmental initiatives in the area and live farther away from services, their obstacles go even deeper than language and proximity, Kovacs said. Many of them immigrated from Latin American countries that don’t widely collect recycling.

“Therefore, many community members do not understand the need to recycle, and more do not know how or where to do it,” she wrote in an email. “This project will amplify current recycling programs ensuring everyone in Eagle County understands where, why, and how to recycle and has equitable access to do so.”

On the other hand, TRP’s surveys have also found widespread interest in the topic, though specific motivations can vary.

“Across demographics and across ethnic groups, recycling is really seen as a common social good,” Metzler said. “It may be less challenging than it’s perceived to get people on board.”

Even when a recycling program’s leaders understand the need for tailored outreach, addressing it takes staff and money and time, she added, which makes grants like the EPA’s essential for the many local governments that lack the needed resources.

That was certainly true for Joplin, Missouri, Assistant City Manager Tony Robyn said. Boosting the city’s recycling programs had been a topic of discussion ever since the city began rebuilding from a devastating EF5 tornado that struck in 2011. Now the city finally has $1.7 million to make it happen. The plan includes a multimedia advertising campaign with a particular focus on partnering with schools and residents of disadvantaged census tracts. Its goal is to increase participation in Joplin’s opt-in curbside program, which services around 1,650 households out of more than 20,000, based on U.S. Census and city data.

“We really saw this grant as an opportunity to build that program out and do some unique and cool partnerships,” Robyn said.

The potential impact was immediately clear one recent morning at Joplin’s recycling drop-off center, where resident George Haubein said he had learned about the curbside option for the very first time.

“I’m gonna sign up,” he said, adding that he stores his recyclables in his garage, and it was his second trip of the day to bring them all in.

Kandi Potter, a resident of nearby Webb City who comes to Joplin’s center because it accepts more materials than a drop-off closer to home, said her whole family takes part in recycling, but many locals might not see recycling as worth their time.

“It depends on the person,” she said.

At the other end of the spectrum from Joplin is Seattle, which wasn’t among the outreach and education grant recipients but has spent years working to better communicate with a wide variety of residents about its recycling services. Informational materials are available in more than a dozen languages, and residents receive transcreated guidelines once a year in the mail, said Becca Fong, Seattle Public Utilities’ residential compost and recycling program manager.

It wasn’t always this way, Fong said: “We used to do a lot of translating. But we also found that doesn’t necessarily lead to culturally resonant materials.”

That inspired her and her colleagues to start visiting community centers, gathering focus groups and simply sitting down with people going about their days to talk recycling. Now the city has a compendium of recycling terms in multiple languages, images of culturally relevant products and lasting relationships that can be called upon as recycling programs grow and change in the city and across the state.

“We took a big step back and looked at more than just the words,” Fong said. The learning process continues with regular feedback sessions and check-ins with the public as well.

“You can design the most beautiful program … but getting that feedback from customers is what has made us more successful over the years,” she said. “That partnership piece, that is never done.”

While Seattle and many of the EPA grant recipients are particularly populous and diverse places, their efforts to reach multiple audiences — simultaneously teaching and learning from residents, speaking in terms they understand, touching upon the priorities and beliefs they care about — are examples that any community can follow, Metzler with TRP said.

“That two-way street is needed, and it looks different in every community,” she said. “The most important part is starting somewhere, and this is all a journey.”