For now, the world’s most populous country continues to approve import licenses for recovered fiber. | peresanz/Shutterstock
China last week enshrined in law its intent to eliminate “solid waste” imports. Even so, the government continues to approve more imports of recovered fiber.
Sonoco’s converted South Carolina machine will have a capacity of about 180,000 tons per year of recycled paperboard. | Steve Heap/Shutterstock
A major end user of recovered fiber will spend $83 million to retool operations in South Carolina and Wisconsin. But the move comes as the company closes a recycled paperboard mill in Canada.
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Packaging Corporation of America is a major end user of recovered paper in the U.S. | noomcpk/Shutterstock
A Packaging Corporation of America mill that uses recycled fiber will suspend operations for two months as the coronavirus pandemic keeps schools and businesses closed.
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The Total Fiber Recovery project joins a number of other domestic recycled fiber processing capacity expansions that have been announced or come on-line since China began restricting imports. | Siwakorn1933/Shutterstock
A plant taking in mixed paper and OCC is on the way in Virginia, the latest planned domestic market expansion for U.S. recovered fiber.
The U.S. in 2019 shipped 192,000 short tons of mixed paper to South Korea. | Mariusz Bugno/Shutterstock
A large buyer of U.S. scrap paper and plastic is planning measures to reduce imports and increase domestic recycling of those materials.
During recent earnings calls, a number of fiber company executives touched on pricing trends they are seeing around OCC and other grades.
One major U.S. mill operator is actively shipping recycled paper pulp to China, and another is installing equipment to bring in lower grades of paper feedstock. Those were a few takeaways from recent earnings calls from publicly traded paper firms.
So far this year China has approved 3.5 million short tons of recovered fiber for import. | luca pbl/Shutterstock
China recently issued its third round of recovered fiber import permits for 2020, and the volume being allowed in this round is far less than what was approved previously.
Curbside recycling can put additional collection trucks on the road. But the recycling process ultimately brings environmental benefits that far outweigh the extra vehicle emissions, according to a study from Waste Management.
Lower recovered metals prices hurt revenue at a waste-to-energy company, and a group urges a major magazine to use recycled paper.
