Extrusion International USA 6-2019

26 Extrusion International 6/2019 EXTRUSION INTERNATIONAL INDUSTRY NEWS Pacific Northwest Secondary Sorting Demonstration Project – Results released A collaborative group of government and packaging industry leaders, led by the Plastics Industry Association (PLASTICS), have released the results from the first-of-its-kind Pacific Northwest Sec- ondary Sorting Demonstration Project (PNW Sort). The group set out with the goal of determining how a wider range of materials can be captured from the residential recycling stream. The project made use of a portable Secondary Material Recovery Facility (Secondary MRF) that operated for 60 days in Portland, receiving, sorting and measuring the possible recovery from two types of material streams from four MRFs located in Oregon and Washington. Titus MRF Services operated the facility and provided the equipment for the project. “Projects like this are important as we work towards a more sus- tainable system nationwide,” commented Scott Farling, vice presi- dent of business development and research at Titus MRF Services. “While top producing primary MRFs can recover close to 90% of the recycled materials from the waste stream, we’d like to see that number increase in the coming years. This project allowed us to dig deeper to recover what remains: the low-volume and difficult-to- manually-sort materials along withmachine yield losses.” Materials recovered in this study included polyethylene, mixed pa- per, cartons, polypropylene, polystyrene, and PET bottles and ther- moforms. The results of the Pacific Northwest Secondary Sorting Demonstration Project suggest that a regional secondary sorting MRF sized to serve the populations of both Oregon and Washing- ton would: • Increase material recovery or landfill diversion by more than 50,000 tons (100million pounds) per year, equivalent to 2,500 semi- trailer truckloads of recovered materials bound for recycling facili- ties. Plastics Industry Association (PLASTICS), PNWSort.org • Increase the recovery rate by 3% to 6% [1] without significant pro- gram changes or investments. • Generate 46 green jobs per Secondary MRF. •Reduce thegenerationof greenhousegases bymore than130,000 tons per year; this is equivalent to taking more than 27,600 cars off of the road. [2] • Enable future expansion of the accepted materials list without needing to retrofit Primary MRFs. • Provide accountability for all collected recyclable materials and eliminate the risk of potential mismanagement and pollution. “Our biggest takeaway following this pilot program is that a sec- ondary sorting facilitymodel is aviableoption tohelpmeet theever- increasing demand for recycled materials,” said Tony Radoszewski, president and CEO of PLASTICS. “The project data shows the value that can be extracted from landfill-bound or mixed materials. It is our hope that the data from this report can help inform state and local decisionmakers on how to improve our recovery systems.” The projectwas fundedby theAmericanChemistry Council, AmSty, Berry Global, the Carton Council, LyondellBasell, Metro (Portland Metro Regional Government), Milliken & Company and PLASTICS. [1] Based on a regional model where MRFs recover 88% of recy- clable materials [2] According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Green- house Gases Equivalencies Calculator Vice President of Sales and Service promoted David Schroeder, president and CEO of Graham Engineering Corporation has promoted Michael Duff to vice president of sales and service. Michael Duff joined the company in January 2015 as business development director for extrusion. “Mike’s experience, coupled with his commitment to our cus- tomers’ success, makes hima logical choice to lead our sales and service team,” said David Schroeder. Michael Duff joined the company from the packaging technolo- gies division of PolyOne Corporation (formerly Spartech), where he was director of strategic partner development for the ther- moforming and rollstock extrusion markets. Previously he had served in project and plant engineering, manufacturing and op- erations management, technology and product development, and sales and consulting roles, including a 22 year career with Reynolds Food Packaging (formerly KAMA and IVEX Corpora- tions). Graham Engineering www.grahamengineering.com Michael Duff