2014 ReMA Convention & Exposition Highlights: A Memorable Event

July/August 2014

ISRI’s 2014 Gathering in Las Vegas might go down in association history for a flying shoe, but it was noteworthy for many other reasons.

ISRI’s 2014 convention in Las Vegas received the broadest, highest-profile media coverage of any ReMA show to date, with mentions in scores of national and international news outlets. It even received mentions on Saturday Night Live’s “Weekend Update” segment April 12 and in President Obama’s address at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner in May. ISRI’s annual event received such extensive exposure, however, for an unfortunate occurrence: A protester slipped past security and hurled a shoe at Hillary Rodham Clinton, the convention’s keynote speaker. (For more details, see “A Keynote Speech With a Kick” on page 94.)

Fortunately, attendees had many other reasons to remember this year’s ReMA convention. The event attracted roughly 5,750 attendees, making it the third-largest convention since the association’s founding in 1987. Once again, it featured the world’s largest scrap recycling industry exposition, as well as more than four dozen educational workshops and numerous networking opportunities. Plus, there was a memorable closing-night beach party at the Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino, the convention’s host venue.

The 2014 convention also ushered in a new slate of national ReMA officers, with Jerry Simms of Atlas Metal & Iron Corp. (Denver)—ISRI’s chair for the past two years—passing the leadership baton to new ReMA chair Doug Kramer of Kramer Metals (Los Angeles), with Mark Lewon of Utah Metal Works (Salt Lake City), Brian Shine of Manitoba Corp. (Lancaster, N.Y.), and Gary Champlin of Champlin Tire Recycling (Concordia, Kan.) rounding out the 2014-2016 national officer roster as chair-elect, vice chair, and secretary/treasurer, respectively.

Spotlight Highlights

Cautious optimism for the economy. “The global economy and U.S. economy get rich slowly,” announced Jason Schenker, president of Prestige Economics (Austin, Texas), at the spotlight on the economy, citing his company’s forecast that global gross domestic product will rise 3.3 percent in 2014 and 3.4 percent in 2015; eurozone GDP will grow 0.8 percent and 1.1 percent; U.S. GDP will grow 2.5 percent and 2.6 percent; and Chinese GDP will grow 7.3 percent and 7.2 percent.

Schenker delineated some “causes for concern,” such as the slowdown of Chinese manufacturing and “two-speed economies,” such as the European Union, which is prospering in the north and sluggish in the south, and the United States, which is thriving in the North Dakota-to-Texas energy corridor and the Washington, D.C., area but not in the rest of the country. He predicted that, five years from now, “we’re going to think interest rates were low, U.S. taxes were low, natural gas prices were cheap, the dollar was strong, emerging market growth and wealth were low—and the U.S. should have fixed entitlements when we had the chance,” he said.

With the economy facing weak growth and lots of risks, Dan North, chief economist for the Americas for trade credit insurance provider Euler Hermes North America (Owings Mills, Md.), voiced cautious optimism. His GDP growth estimates for 2014 were in the same range as Schenker’s: above 3.1 percent globally—“not too strong, and most of that coming from China and India”— 0.9 percent for the eurozone, and “modest, 2.8-percent growth in the U.S., largely due to the debt crisis and structural unemployment issues.”

The positives for the U.S. economy, North said, are ultra-loose monetary policies, zero-percent interest rates, vigorous bank lending, strong corporate profits, cheap energy, and highly productive U.S. workers. The negatives? “Uncertainty from Washington, the housing market at risk, high structural unemployment, and future inflation risk.”

The construction industry is similarly optimistic and cautious about the U.S. economy, said Ken Simonson, chief economist for the Associated General Contractors of America (Arlington, Va.). Economic pluses from the contractors’ perspective include the boom in oil shale exploration; the Panama Canal expansion, which has spurred huge construction spending at both ocean and inland ports; and the recovery of the housing market. Negatives are decreased government spending on schools and infrastructure, consumers switching from shopping in stores to online buying, and the shrinkage of office space per employee. Noting that construction industry employment has risen in 38 of the 50 U.S. states recently, Simonson concluded that “the recovery is happening, but it’s still limited.”

Ferrous industry voices concerns. At the ferrous spotlight, Sean Davidson, global scrap editor at American Metal Market (New York), presented the results of a survey of 700 steel industry players that gave an overall sentiment that was optimistic but cautious and concerned about supply. When asked to name the biggest challenges facing the industry this year, 42 percent of survey respondents said a margin squeeze; 19 percent said weak scrap flows; 16 percent said business costs; another 16 percent said government regulations; 5 percent said weak export markets; and 7 percent cited other concerns. Meanwhile, when mill buyers were asked to name their biggest concern about scrap companies, 67 percent said supply concerns and 33 percent said quality issues.

Tom Danjczek, former president and now senior adviser to the Steel Manufacturers Association (Washington, D.C.), issued a rousing call for growth in the domestic steel industry. “In the U.S., we have lots of scrap, and there are real benefits to expanding steel production,” he said. He pointed out the substantial volume of U.S. ferrous scrap exports and noted disapprovingly that this country imported about 26 percent of its steel in 2012. “Low energy prices, high productivity, and access to the world’s largest capital market” should render the United States self-sufficient in steelmaking raw materials, he asserted. John Harris, CEO of Aaristic Services (Innisfil, Ontario), a steel industry consulting firm, cautioned that younger workers entering the steel industry “don’t know what’s happening” in scrap, and those entering the scrap industry don’t know about steelmaking. That lack of knowledge could turn into grave inefficiencies in the long term, he said.

Harris noted the growth in shredding capacity in North America, from 290 shredders in the 1990s to 350 today, with 60 percent running at full capacity. Meanwhile, the availability of mobile shredders means that a “mom-and-pop place” can go out, buy a small shredder, and take “feed from the big shredders,” which has resulted in a more dynamic and uncertain shredder and shredded steel market, he said. Rich Brady, executive vice president, Southeast, at OmniSource Corp. (Fort Wayne, Ind.), jokingly attributed the growth in shredders to “a lot of great shredder salesmen,” but he asserted that there’s no overcapacity crisis. Instead, he believes big operators will adjust by emphasizing downstream processing and efficiency. Further, “as shredding technology evolves, people realize it’s an efficient way to process,” he observed. “Look for other inputs [for operators] to process in that equipment.”

Moderator Phillip K. Bell, SMA president, asked the panelists if they think China will become a net exporter of scrap. All of the panelists said yes, with Harris suggesting China’s scrap supplies will catch up with its processing capacity before 2025. Danjczek pointed out that whether exports occur isn’t always a question of markets and demand but—in the case of China—can be determined by value-added-tax policy.

It’s an unpredictable year for copper. “Copper really is at a crossroads,” said Michael Turek, senior director of the metals group at brokerage firm Newedge (Chicago), “with an array of compelling bullish factors aligned against an equally impressive array of bearish factors.” That makes it difficult to predict where the price of the red metal is going, said panelists at the copper spotlight. Moderator Joe Pickard, ISRI’s chief economist and director of commodities, noted copper’s LME listing price that day was $6,629 a mt, down $890 from a year ago, with overall U.S. copper scrap exports down 16 percent by volume and U.S. imports to China down 18 percent by volume compared with the same period in 2013.

On the bullish side, Turek noted that so far in 2014, LME inventories had shrunk 28 percent—by more than 100,000 mt—and available supply also had decreased substantially. China’s demand is expected to grow 7.5 percent this year, and overall global growth continues to intensify, even in Europe. Bearish factors, however, include a 7.3-percent rise in mining production last year, to 1.2 million mt, and additional availability from new projects coming online in Latin America. Also, copper is very sensitive to movements in the currency markets, and a rising dollar would depress the price.

Looking at copper’s medium-term prospects, “continuing negligible interest-rate growth globally and the Chinese stimulus should at least be supportive … and the recovery in prices could well be steady, but not spectacular,” Turek said. “But don’t get complacent about the sub-$7,000 a [mt] price.”

China—“the big elephant in the room,” as the consumer of 40 percent of the world’s copper—was the focus of Edward Meir, senior commodity consultant with INTL FC Stone (New York). The ruling Communist party recently introduced a package of economic reforms that might “result in China’s curtailing its industrial expansion and reducing its demand for copper,” he said. He also expects copper to be in surplus over the next two years due to increased mine supply from Chile.

Meir expects lower prices in 2014, with the low to date in 2014 of $6,300 a mt possibly dropping to $6,100—or rallying to $7,500. “That’s a big range, but given these markets, [the higher price is] certainly possible—especially if you get fund activity back in,” he said. “There’s no clear case you can make on copper prices; you can take it either way.”

Aluminum faces shortages, growing premiums. The aluminum spotlight featured a lengthy discussion of the Midwest premium—the price being paid for physical delivery of aluminum in the U.S. Midwest above the LME price. The premium has risen from 5 cents a pound in January 2010 to 17.5 cents a pound in January 2014. Ordinarily, such increases take place at a time of material shortages. But while the premium was surging, so was the supply of aluminum in LME-approved Detroit warehouses.

Mike Southwood, a senior consultant with CRU (Wexford, Pa.), attributed the pricing surge to two factors: supply shortages in North America and LME warehousing issues. Despite the growing inventories in Detroit warehouses, the United States is in a “constant state of deficit” with regard to aluminum, he said, primarily due to demand, which increased 39 percent from 2009 to 2012. Historically, the United States turned to primary metal from Canada to fill the shortfall, but its Canadian aluminum imports fell between 2010 and 2012. As a result, American consumers had to look further abroad for imports, which contributed to higher prices because the premium reflects, in part, the cost of delivery.

Those factors don’t account for 2013, however, when U.S. imports from Canada surged again—as did the premium. Southwood attributed this unexpected phenomenon to an explosion of “canceled warrants” in Detroit warehouses. In simple terms, a canceled warrant is an order for delivery from an LME warehouse—usually a sign of physical demand. Because consumers are experiencing long wait times for getting metal out of warehouses—up to 15 months in recent years— they are likely to cancel more warrants, and cancel them earlier, to ensure an adequate supply of metal, Southwood said. This lengthens the backlog, creating artificial shortages and driving up the premiums.

Hoping to solve this problem, the LME announced rules last year that would have shortened the wait to 50 days. UC Rusal (Moscow) won a legal action in December that blocked the change, however, which “destroyed” hopes for warehouse reforms. The result, Southwood said, is a tough 2014 for those who hoped for lower Midwest premiums, “longer queues, and a growing aluminum deficit.”

The LME three-month aluminum price average fell $300 a mt from the end of 2012 to the end of 2013. Southwood attributed $220 of the decline to investors who, for the most part, started the year long and then went short. The remaining $80 he attributed to weak fundamentals, including increasing energy prices and the effect of currency fluctuations. Still, Southwood was modestly bullish on prices. He expects demand for rolled products to grow 24 percent this year and 47 percent next year as demand—primarily from the automotive sector—increases. Meanwhile, Southwood and others on the panel called China the wild card: If the Chinese government remains committed to a decelerating economy, producers will be forced to engage in cutbacks, and the effects could be profound on global markets.

Stainless sees strong demand, primary shortages. Moderator Michael Friedman, president of Sustainable Management Corp. (Louisville, Ky.), set the stage for the nickel/stainless spotlight with two words: perception and reality.

One perception is that worldwide demand remains high. “The market in North America is the strongest market in the world for stainless, to the point where Europeans can’t even understand what’s going on here,” said Al Goodman, a senior trader with ELG Metals (Chicago). The reality is that, despite demand, everyone’s struggling to make a buck. “Like all metals today, we’re seeing a pickup of demand and a lessening of margins to the point where there are no margins,” Goodman said. “There’s tremendous pressure on the whole chain, so at this point in the cycle—which we’ve seen many times in the past—there’s very little profit to be had [and] a lot of work for it.”

On the consuming end, “the mills are struggling to make money because of Chinese imports; they’re having a lot of trouble competing with [China’s] pricing,” Goodman said. That might change, however, because Indonesia, the world’s largest producer of nickel ore, banned the export of unprocessed ores earlier this year. “The nickel spigot has been turned off,” said Prestige Economics’ Jason Schenker. “If that [export ban] continues, there could be a lot more upward price pressure [on nickel]. Right now I think that average prices for this year should be higher than last year, and next year should be higher than this year.”

Long term, “if China is unable to get the ore to make the nickel pig iron it needs, and at some point it has to turn to scrap—the blended product we make in America—that would be a huge game-changer,” Schenker said. “But we’re a ways off from that happening.”

The panel also decried increasing environmental regulation. Earlier this year, “a lot of materials that were typically considered nonhazardous were reclassified as hazardous” by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (Washington, D.C.), said Lee Welgs, vice president/general manager of Apex Material Technologies (Joliet, Ill.), which makes copper, cobalt, and nickel chemicals. “The regulatory push has been led by Europe,” he noted. “Europe’s regulations are the strictest, and we’re just going to follow right along.”

Paper panel looks at the big picture. The speakers at this year’s paper spotlight focused on sustainability. MGM Resorts International (Las Vegas), which operates the Mandalay Bay, discovered its companywide recycling rate was only 10 percent in 2007, said Sustainability Manager Regina Stepanov. After building 24 recycling docks at its 16 Las Vegas properties, it reached a nearly 53-percent recycling rate in 2013 and now hopes to reach 50 percent recycling at each property. You won’t find recycling bins at most MGM properties, however, Stepanov said. Instead, the company employs 200 trained workers who sort recyclable and compostable items from waste. It continues to look for places where it can reduce packaging or replace nonrecyclable items with recyclable ones.

At Starbucks (Seattle), even though packaging is “a tiny bit of our carbon footprint,” it’s customers’ No. 1 issue, said Jim Hanna, director of environmental impact. It now looks at a packaging material’s total lifecycle impact, from manufacturing to disposal. For example, its cold drink cups are now polypropylene, not polyethylene terephthalate, which allows it to use less plastic per cup, and the cups are more likely to be accepted in recycling programs.

Hanna pointed out that 80 percent of Star­bucks’ cups leave the store and end up in homes and offices. To increase recycling of fiber coffee cups, the company must increase the overall collection of coated foodservice packaging, out of which Starbucks cups are “just a drop in the bucket.” Scaling up collection of that material can “drive market solutions for the product,” he said, asking that ReMA add cups and other food-safe packaging to paper specification 52 to help increase the volume.

GreenBlue (Charlottesville, Va.) is a small nonprofit that addresses business sustainability challenges that “require an industry working group effort,” explained Tom Pollock, senior manager for forest products. It has created a voluntary “how-to-recycle” labeling scheme that provides clearer guidance on recycling common product packaging. The group also created the Sustainable Mill Assessment and Reporting Tool, or SMART, for buyers and sellers of paper products. Users select among 25 performance indicators to find the best fiber, whether recovered or virgin, for their needs and consider its environmental impact. Now GreenBlue is tackling the issue of certified forest products. Existing certification programs are not meeting the needs of everyone in the forest product supply chain, Pollock said. He urged attendees to ensure the recovery sector is heard in discussions of forest product certification.

(Read about the plastics and electronics spotlights in those commodities’ individual sections below.)

Reducing Theft

Protecting cargo on the truck. Almost all cargo thefts involve someone breaking a company policy or law, said Jeff Lieberman, special investigation unit manager for Sentry Insurance (Stevens Point, Wis.), who presented “Cargo Container Theft: Preventing the Rip-offs, Scams, and Cons” with Don Finch, principal of Finch & Finch Investigations (Greenwood, Ind.). Even so, transportation companies and recyclers can do more to protect cargo, Lieberman said. “Companies should review their security practices and policies. You’d be amazed how many companies don’t even invest in a $75 lock” for the container, he said.

An ongoing driver shortage leads some companies “to skimp on driver background checks,” Lieberman said. That doesn’t make sense, Finch added. “The driver is the one person who’s responsible for the load when it’s on the road.” Companies should ask themselves, “Would a bank trust this guy with $200,000?” Finch said. If the answer is no, why should the trucking company trust that driver with $200,000 in cargo?

Many cargo thefts involve the driver as well as organized crime rings, Lieberman said. For the most part, it doesn’t matter what the cargo is, Finch said, as long as the thieves have someone to sell it to. Some rings, however, target specific types of commodities, which they steal for a particular network, Lieberman said. Because these criminals tend to follow loads, most trucking companies tell their drivers not to stop for the first 250 miles. The farther a driver drives, the less likely it is for criminals to follow, he said. Alternatively, thieves will approach drivers at truck stops, Lieberman said, and offer them prostitutes or money in exchange for their walking away from the cargo. “There are so many drivers willing to take a payoff to give up a load [that] highway robbery is not required,” Finch said.

Statistically, drivers involved in cargo theft tend to be male, employed with the company for less than 30 days, and have a criminal record involving theft or drugs, Lieberman said. Some schemes use a fictitious driver or trucking company, Finch said. In other cases, a driver will intercept a load a company is expecting by meeting the delivery truck just outside its property line and saying the road to the facility is blocked. To improve your odds against cargo theft, Finch recommends working with reputable companies or vetting a trucking company.

Catching thieves in the act. “Enforcement Solutions to Material Theft” described a new approach used to catch thieves stealing metal or other materials sold as scrap. 3SI Security Systems (Exton, Pa.) has been deploying a patented device originally designed for solving bank robberies, said Richard Long, senior vice president and director of global law enforcement. The compact, flexible device attaches surreptitiously to common target materials. Terrence Cunningham, the Wellesley, Mass., police chief, explained how he has used it to catch those stealing copper wire a few inches thick from a municipal light plant. Other uses have tracked thefts of streetlights, cable, tractor-trailer tires, fire hydrants, construction equipment, bicycles, vehicle batteries, and propane tanks, Long said.

The device can hold a charge while dormant for two to three years, Long said. It can deploy when moved, when removed from a defined geographic area, or based on other triggers. Deployment launches 3SI’s proprietary tracking system, which the device owner can access via computer or mobile phone, and it triggers a text message to designated recipients. The device transmits a global positioning system signal, a cellular signal, and a radio-frequency signal every six to 60 seconds that shows its speed, direction, path of travel, and GPS coordinates—information useful for immediate pursuit and for later investigation and prosecution. The signal will continue for about seven hours after deployment, with options to extend that life span to weeks or months. The RF signal is useful for areas without cellular service or where the GPS signal can’t reach the satellite, such as within a large building, narrowing the search area sufficiently to allow police to obtain a search warrant, Long explained.

Law enforcement agencies can purchase and deploy the devices, Long said, but other community members sometimes band together to purchase them for the police to fight a specific crime problem. Private companies also use them for internal investigations without police involvement. 3SI sells the devices individually for $450 each and charges a monthly monitoring fee per device. Long noted that 99 percent of the devices used to track materials theft have been recovered, compared with 75 percent of those used for catching bank robbers.

The prosecutors’ perspective. Materials theft is new territory for prosecutors, said Candace Mosley, director of programs for the National District Attorneys Association (Alexandria, Va.). “We are somewhat intimidated by you,” she said to a room full of recyclers, but we “need you as our substantive experts” to help combat materials theft crimes, she said at “Prosecuting Materials Theft: What It Takes to Make a Case.”

Fred Burmeister, deputy district attorney for Salt Lake County, Utah, was equally forthright: “I had preconceived ideas—negative and largely untrue—about metal recyclers,” he admitted. Even so, “it’s part of the prosecutor’s craft to learn and communicate to strangers things they know nothing about … so the jury understands and finds the criminal guilty.” When metals theft cases started to appear more frequently in his caseload, he developed a task force to address them. Such collaborations should consist of four elements, he said: building relationships, information-sharing, assembling a case for prosecution, and identifying internal theft schemes and patterns of unlawful activity.

Building relationships helps tackle the preconceived ideas on all sides of the issue, Burmeister said. Information-sharing can be difficult when there are multiple jurisdictions—there are 13 law enforcement agencies in Salt Lake County, for example. One police agency on the task force hired a metals theft coordinator for the area who now sends information to all stakeholders and to ScrapTheftAlert.com. Challenges include deciding who pays for such a person, getting all the relevant stakeholders to participate, and sorting out privacy issues.

Scrapyards can play a “significant role” in prosecuting metals theft by following consistent identification practices with each transaction, he said. For new customers, get a valid government-issued photo ID, “look at the person” to check that name and appearance match the ID, make a copy of the ID, and take a photo of the person—without a hat or hood and facing the camera. If you follow this procedure consistently, he said, you can help identify suspects at trial even if you don’t remember them.

Burmeister spoke further about identifying internal theft or patterns of illegal activity. In the Salt Lake City area, employees of a local copper mine were suspected of stealing obsolete equipment from mine property and selling it for scrap. With the help of an informant and two scrap companies, the suspects were caught in the act and charged with multiple crimes, including money laundering and racketeering.

Safe-and-Sound Operations

Mobile equipment risks. Working around rail is “one of the most dangerous aspects in a yard,” said Tony Smith, ReMA safety outreach manager, at “Mobile Equipment Safety in and Around Your Facility.” A string of four loaded railcars can weigh more than a million pounds, Smith said. “When they roll, they’re awfully quiet. You can actually feel them before you [hear] them.”

Rail safety requires good communication—with hand signals or a dedicated radio channel—between the person who’s pushing the cars and a switch person at, on, or in front of the switch to warn anyone coming in front of that string of cars, Smith said. Also, monitor along the tracks for objects or people that could come into contact with the cars. To determine a safe distance from the track, put the outside of your foot against the side of the rail and put your opposite arm out to your side, Smith said. Any material within your reach from that spot is “fouling the tracks” and could cause damage, injury, or derailment.

Smith gave other recommendations for operating mobile equipment. For all mobile equipment, train operators, other workers, and visitors about each machine’s blind spots, Smith said. Operators should walk around the equipment they operate before they start it up, including after every break. To avoid tipping a machine, be aware of its center of gravity and how a load can alter it. While operating it, don’t forget to look up, Smith added. “Pay attention to what’s above, such as power lines, buildings, and other equipment.” Hazards when working indoors include blind corners and open bay doors. Put traffic controls into place, use horns, and slow down, he cautioned. “There are many opportunities for collisions.”

When on foot, stay at least 75 feet from operating equipment and keep an eye out for flying material. Before approaching running equipment, make eye contact with the operator and wait for him or her to give you permission to enter the work area, he said.

A new Occupational Safety and Health Administration (Washington, D.C.) local emphasis program for Region 5 focuses on powered industrial vehicles—not just powered industrial trucks such as forklifts, Smith explained. He suggested that scrap facilities develop or expand their mobile equipment safety programs to cover wheel loaders, skid-steers, material handlers, and railcars.

Safety do’s and don’ts. ReMA Safety Outreach Manager Joe Bateman approached the serious issue of scrap­yard safety with some humor in “They Didn’t Really Do That, Did They?” The most common cause of death in a scrapyard is being run over by mobile equipment, Bateman said, followed by failing to follow lock-out/tag-out procedures. He shared details from a dozen fatalities that occurred in the U.S. recycling industry in 2013. The accidents involved unguarded equipment, stacked material, material handlers, trucks, and torched material.

“I’ve heard nearly every excuse for not following safety rules and procedures,” Bateman said. For example, during several ReMA safety blueprint visits, he hears from members they remove the guarding on alligator shears because workers have difficulty seeing through it. “The human eye naturally stops at yellow,” which is the color of most guards, he pointed out. Instead of removing the guards, however, Bateman suggested painting them with flat black paint, which makes it easier to see through them.

Bateman also suggested attendees analyze near-misses that occur at their facilities. “Are you doing something about that ‘almost’ incident so it doesn’t turn into a reality?” he asked. Begin by acknowledging that they happen—whether you hear about them or not, he said. Then define what near-misses are and make sure employees understand what they are. Finally, during safety meetings, ask workers to write down an example of something that “almost” went wrong in the previous week as well as a suggestion of how to avoid that risk in the future.

Workers tell him they ignore safety steps because they’re not convenient, Bateman said. “Safety rules are not meant to be convenient,” he pointed out. “They’re meant to save lives, and they will—if we use them.”

Managing environmental risks. Scrapyards face a wide range of environmental compliance risks, according to Stacy Brown of Freberg Environmental (Denver), in “Are You Naked? Why You Need to Examine Your Liability Exposure.” Federal regulations alone address hazardous and solid waste, stormwater, emissions, polychlorinated biphenyls, and more; some state laws are even more stringent, he said. For the most thorough prevention of environmental violations and protection from liability, Brown recommended a combination of employee training, engineered controls, compliance auditing, insurance, and ISRI’s Superfund Recycling Equity Act due diligence compliance program.

Training can address some common, easily avoided violations such as those related to recordkeeping, housekeeping, and material labeling, Brown said. ISRI’s SREA program protects facilities from becoming potentially responsible parties to Superfund sites. For stormwater issues, recyclers must be diligent about following plan requirements to avoid hefty fines and legal liability. Compliance audits can reveal environmental problems before they become legal issues—“What you don’t know can hurt you,” Brown pointed out—but he urged working with an environmental consultant and perhaps an environmental lawyer before conducting an audit for the greatest protection. Some state and federal laws allow self-reporting and voluntary cleanup without further penalty, he added.

More competition in the environmental insurance market should mean recyclers can find better terms and conditions, Brown said. (His firm is affiliated with RecycleGuard®, the ISRI-sponsored insurance program.) He recommends facilities purchase general liability plans with environmental impairment liability coverage for gradual spills, sudden and accidental coverage related to on-site storage tanks, and additional coverage for the transportation of pollutants and potential liability related to non-owned disposal sites. Commercial general liability policies alone might be sufficient for facilities with low exposure to environmental risks, he added. Environmental impairment coverage typically covers on-site cleanup of environmental incidents in a specified time period. Recyclers should look for policies that are retroactive to ensure their coverage is continuous from the date of their first policy, he added.

Brown pointed out the difference between “sudden and accidental” and “gradual” coverage. The former is less expensive, he said, but it only covers incidents (such as a spill) that both start and are discovered within a short time period, typically less than a month. With gradual coverage, the starting date of the event (such as an underground tank leak) does not matter, so long as it was discovered during the policy term and is reported once discovered.

Catalytic converter conundrums. The session “Handling Catalytic Converters” seemed to raise more questions about grading and pricing than answer them. “It’s more about blind luck,” said Mark Lewon of Utah Metal Works. The types of catalysts have grown over the years from about a dozen to more than 50, he said. Only the original equipment manufacturer knows what’s in its particular catalyst, said Kevin Moore, president of All Raw Materials Consulting (Clarkston, Mich.). “But OEMs see that as proprietary and highly valued [information], and they have little incentive to share.” Even two vehicles of the same make, model, and year could have different catalysts, said Sanath Kumar, global marketing director for mobile emissions catalysts of BASF Corp. (Iselin, N.J.). Regulations in the market where the manufacturer sells the car drive the design of the catalyst, which means the amount and types of precious metals can vary greatly, Kumar said. In the future, however, pricing might become easier as regulations in different parts of the world converge, he noted. To determine a catalyst’s value, BASF crushes it and pays the vendor for what’s in it, Kumar said.

“Every catalytic converter that comes to a recycling facility could be different and difficult to identify,” Moore said. “The industry needs to develop transparent pricing by converter type from an unbiased research or publication company for companywide use,” he said. “Without it, scrap companies will have to manage the system with trusted customers. Given the high risk, some [companies] may need to consider not participating in the converter scrap market.” UMW assumes it’s receiving low-end catalysts and pays accordingly, Lewon said. It would be time-consuming and costly to take a core sample of each one, he said.

Mulling Electronics Issues

Electronics processors address CRTs, EPR. The spotlight on electronics looked at several challenges facing e-scrap processors. Despite media reports that the United States lacks the capacity to handle the volume of discarded cathode-ray tube devices, the “CRT problem” is a myth, said Joe Clayton, vice president of MRP Corp. (Hunt Valley, Md.). The United States has the technology and facilities to recycle CRTs in an environmentally sound manner, he said, adding he gets calls every week from CRT processing facilities with excess capacity asking for customers. The impediment, he said, is suppliers’ “willingness to pay” for proper recycling.

Dag Adamson of LifeSpan (Newton, Mass.) questioned whether anyone has sufficiently defined good CRT recycling practices. He was critical of what he called outdated regulations, particularly from OSHA. “The OSHA standard won’t protect you or your family if you take home poison on your person” from CRT processing, he said.

The discussion also touched on extended producer responsibility programs, which require electronics manufacturers to ensure a certain volume of electronics are recycled in a given state, typically by providing funds for collection and processing. Adamson wasn’t wholly critical of the idea, but he pointed out that EPR “shifts the business model from a value proposition to who has a lower cost.” As a result, he explained, his company has walked away from municipal contracts because the business just wasn’t profitable enough.

Moderator Jim Levine, president of Regency Technologies (Twinsburg, Ohio), noted that manufacturers “participate to the pound they’re required to [fund], and that’s it.” For recyclers, that might mean they can accept electronics from the public without charge only while the year’s funding lasts—then they have to charge consumers who drop off products with negative value. “The recyclers then become the bad guys,” he noted. One goal of EPR was to get manufacturers to focus on product life cycles and end-of-life issues, said Craig Boswell, president of HOBI International (Batavia, Ill.), but that’s happened only on a limited basis, in part because the biggest EPR costs relate to processing older products. LifeSpan’s Adamson said he believes the problem ultimately can be solved through education. “There’s a perception that recycling is easy. You need to educate [people] because [they] think recycling is free.”

Despite these and other challenges, the panelists agreed there are more business opportunities in electronics processing, especially in unexploited niches. “There’s a lot more competition and regulation,” Levine conceded. “But the e-scrap sector still has an entrepreneurial spirit like the larger scrap industry.”

CRT lead concerns. When recycling CRTs, which contain leaded glass, there is a difference between operating in compliance with federal regulations and operating with the highest regard for worker safety, speakers said at “Lead Exposure From CRT Recycling.” Leaders at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (Washington, D.C.) say that the federal government’s permissible exposure limit for lead is too high—and it’s having a negative, lasting impact on scrap companies, their employees, and their families. Lead poisoning can cause infertility, mental health issues, neuropathy, and even coma or death when acute. Common side effects also include joint and muscle pain, depression, weakness, and abdominal pain.

Elena Page, a physician who works on health hazard evaluation programs for NIOSH, described an electronics processing worker who unknowingly tracked lead into his home, and his two children, ages one and two, contracted high levels of lead poisoning. As a result, the children will have lifelong health and psychiatric problems and their I.Q. will never be what it could have been otherwise. “This was preventable,” Page said. “Many companies and employers are working hard, but they just didn’t know what to do” to prevent lead exposure.

Even if a worker washes his or her hands or takes a shower after a shift ends, lead can still be present on his or her body, Page said. Best practices include tests that make sure workers do not leave the workplace with lead on their bodies or clothing, frequent air and surface testing, and limiting exposure to relevant work areas, Page said.

Mark Matza of the Fortune Group (Jersey City, N.J.) agreed with NIOSH’s best practice recommendations and urged companies that find they have high levels of lead exposure to bring in professionals to conduct testing and establish a lead safety plan for the facility.

NIOSH is advocating that the federal government lower its permissible lead limit. The agency also conducts free health hazard evaluations at the request of companies or its employees, and the request can be kept confidential. Even though it costs money to ensure that your company is meeting the highest safety standards, the cost of not doing it could be greater: Employees affected by lead poisoning could sue your company, and that could put you out of business, Page said.

The future of e-scrap. Electronics recycling in the next five years will likely focus on mobile devices and evolutions in their designs that should make them more recyclable and reusable, panelists said at the “Future Trends in Electronics Recycling” workshop.

Most mobile phones made today have security features—called kill switches—that kill usability and destroy data if a phone is lost or stolen, or when a user disposes of it. The process, also called “bricking,” might make consumers more comfortable about the personal information they store on their phones, but for recyclers, resellers, and refurbishers, it means those devices can never be used again as phones, thus they lose all reuse value. Recyclers are stacking these phones at their facilities, waiting—and hoping—that they might be able to do something with them in the future, said panelist Lane Epperson of HiTech Assets (Oklahoma City).

To address this issue, manufacturers are looking to design future mobile devices that strike a balance between securing privacy and data and allowing reuse, repair, and recycling. Sprint Corp. (Overland Park, Kan.) is developing mobile devices that incorporate “modularity,” allowing consumers to replace or upgrade segments of their phones as needed, such as displays, processors, memory, and batteries. This would extend the devices’ life, and recycling could focus on modules instead of complete units, said Darren Beck, Sprint’s director of environmental initiatives.

What’s not clear yet is how quickly and easily recyclers and the scrap industry can adapt to such changes, Epperson said. Designers want to immediately provide consumers with what they want, but recyclers need sufficient lead time to think through downstream recycling.

Still, figuring out what consumers want isn’t easy. Many say they would prefer “green” products that can be easily recycled, but what they’re really looking for is quality, price, and features, Beck said. “Some fraction of the market will respond to modularity, but no one has really figured it out yet.”

Another trend electronics recyclers could see in the next five years is government-mandated third-party certification of recyclers that export to ensure that downstream recycling meets environmental standards, said Walter Alcorn, vice president of environmental affairs and industry sustainability at the Consumer Electronics Association (Arlington, Va.).

The Potential of Plastics

The global plastics recycling picture. The spotlight on plastics focused on the plastics recycling picture in three corners of the globe: China, Europe, and Brazil. China’s Green Fence regulatory enforcement push has made shipping recycled plastics there risky business: Containers loaded with unwashed, unsorted plastics might be rejected at the dock. To continue to export to China, “recyclers need to invest more in sorting and cleaning equipment,” said moderator Philip Karig, managing director of Mathelin Bay Associates (St. Louis and Berlin). “The easy days of stuff-and-ship are over.”

In Europe, overregulation has led to high energy costs and shifted plastics manufacturing to the United States, reported Surendra Borad, chairman of Gemini Corp. (Antwerp, Belgium). “There is absolutely no logic in placing restrictions when there are about 10 million [mt of plastics] still being landfilled in Europe—about 40 percent of Europe’s plastics generation,” he said. Even though Green Fence has spawned confusion and lowered China’s 2013 plastics imports from Germany 38 percent and from France 69 percent, Borad considers the enforcement measure a blessing in disguise. “It will lead to better quality and high volume in Europe,” he said.

Brazil is going through an “interesting moment” as its 27 states try to comply with a 2010 federal law that requires every one of the country’s 5,565 cities to introduce curbside recycling by October, said Adriano Assi, publisher of Reciclagem Moderna (São Paulo). Only 443 cities have curbside recycling currently, although 60 percent of cities claim to have neighborhoods with some kind of recycling program. “Will we be ready by October? No, we won’t,” Assi said. “It won’t happen in the next month, or in the next year, but within two years Brazil will be very active” in curbside recycling.

Overall, Assi anticipates major improvements in Brazil’s plastics recycling. “Brazil has an average recycling rate of 46 percent,” he said. “We would recycle more, but we don’t have more—the guys can’t lay their hands on the material, so we export a lot of scrap to other countries, which means that the price of scrap in Brazil will come down.”

Finding value in plastic film. Plastic films, like those used in bags and wraps, are increasing in popularity among both consumers and recyclers, said speakers at “Understanding Plastic Film Recycling,” so it’s essential to understand how best to take advantage of this burgeoning market. In 2014, the United States produced an estimated 8 billion pounds of plastic film, bags, and wraps, according to Dave Heglas, senior director of material resources for Trex Co. (Winchester, Va.), and plastic film recycling has increased 55 percent since 2005.

“But not all plastic bags and wraps are created equal,” said Phil Rozenski, director of sustainability for Hilex Poly Co. (Hartsville, S.C.), which takes resins and turns them back into bags. “Plastics are as different as copper and steel, and people need to be educated about what can be recycled and what’s not financially viable,” Rozenski said. Different films have different melting temperatures, and combining them could shut down processing lines.

Both speakers said curbside recycling often doesn’t work well for film because it becomes dirty in the single-stream recycling mix. Rozenski said he believes more opportunity exists on the collection side with plastic bag take-back programs at stores and shopping malls. Further, if processing companies could find a way to make money at it, they could help materials recovery facilities become more efficient by taking plastic bags out of the recycling stream. Heglas also supports organizational collection programs targeted at a specific material. Potential partners could include schools, nonprofits, and retail stores, including large shopping centers, he said. Another opportunity could be providing film recycling services to your fiber and metal customers.

Heglas agreed that polyethylene film recycling is growing, but he’s starting to see a plateau in demand. “Know your market, know your material, and know how to add value to your recycling program,” he advised attendees. Among his tips were to keep like material together, to understand potential contaminants, and to perform account audits of your operation. When selling the material, know your customers’ requirements and tolerances for contaminants, moisture levels, bale size, and weight, he said.

Key to improving plastic film recycling is educating the general public: The greatest challenge is that most people reuse plastic bags for bin liners, pet waste, and other household uses, Rozenski said.

Trends in Tires

What’s new in crumb? “Advancements in Crumb Rubber Technology” addressed improvements in crackermill technology and how one company produces micronized rubber powder. The crackermill takes pieces of tire rubber and reduces them to fine powders, said Charles Astafan, general manager of Columbus McKinnon Corp. (Sarasota, Fla.). Manufacturers originally developed the machines for grinding nonvulcanized rubber and have since adapted them for steel-free vulcanized rubber, including tire buffings and industrial scrap, and to meet demands for finer grinds. The biggest change was decoupling the grinding rolls, Astafan said, which now can operate independently and at different, variable speeds. That allows processors to vary the grinding rolls’ friction ratio. Today’s equipment can reduce material to 30 to 80 mesh, he said. The equipment also comes with programmable controls and diagnostics for monitoring roll speed, power consumption, lubrication, and cooling systems.

Lehigh Technologies (Tucker, Ga.) produces micronized rubber powder, which it ships worldwide into three markets, said Bill Schreiber, technical director for plastics: tires and industrial rubber; asphalt, paints, and coatings; and plastics. Customers use the powder in tires, waterproof barriers, polyurethane foam, asphalt roofing underlayment, polypropylene products such as flooring, and high-density polyethylene applications such as containers as well as paints and other coatings.

The company uses a cryogenic process to pulverize the rubber, and it conducted a study that shows little to no difference between particles produced cryogenically and those produced at ambient temperatures. As a result of the study, some companies have changed specifications that previously mandated the use of ambient material, he added. The company produces 40- to 300-mesh powders from a variety of infeed material, including a shred and flash mix, truck tread, clean shred, buffings, and flash trim.

The future of tire pyrolysis. Pyrolysis—the use of heat to convert tires to liquid fuels and solid carbon black—could become more accepted as scrap tire recyclers look for ways to process excess shred or crumb rubber, said Mary Sikora, publisher of Scrap Tire News (Leesburg, Va.) and moderator of “Pyrolysis and Energy Generation in the Scrap Industry,” but companies have not used it “on a commercial scale for an adequate period of time to fully demonstrate [the] long-term operating economics and char marketability,” she noted.

The biggest hindrance to pyrolysis is the high capital cost associated with it, said Craig Sultan, a San Francisco-based investment director with Redclays Capital (Seattle). To attract investors, companies will need to demonstrate that they have sufficient feedstock to support the operation, that they have orders for the final product, and that they can continuously produce it. Investors will become more interested in pyrolysis as government mandates increasingly prohibit landfilling or require a certain level of recycled content, Sultan said. He was bullish on pyrolysis’s potential due to the existence of mandates and buyers for the byproducts. “Everything is coming together. Within the next five years or more, there will be a breakout in significant commercial entities” processing tires through pyrolysis, he said.

Using pyrolysis, Reklaim (Seattle) can produce about 10 tons of carbon black a day at its Boardman, Ore., plant, said President Thomas Redd. His firm starts with crumb rubber that’s 99-percent metal free to avoid the up-front costs associated with downsizing a whole tire, he said. It produces a carbon black powder, which it pelletizes; a condensed liquid fuel similar to a diesel, which it improves and markets as boiler fuel; and noncondensable gases—propane, butane, and methane—which it plans to use as an internal energy source. Although the company sells the liquid fuel, its primary product is carbon black, Redd said.

Worldwide, about 75 percent of carbon black goes into tires and about 25 percent into nontire rubber and specialty applications, including plastic coloring, he said. Environmental regulations have limited the traditional supply of carbon black from North America and Western Europe, Redd said, which is supporting the production of recycled carbon black. The material also has caught the attention of global tire manufacturers as they look for ways to meet their sustainability goals, Redd said. For a manufacturer to accept a new raw material, however, it must meet four criteria: price, quality, availability, and suitability, he noted. Even so, he said he sees opportunity for this product. Annual world demand for carbon black is more than 11 million tons a year, almost none of which currently comes from recycled material, he said. It would take 20 pyrolysis plants, each processing 2 million tires a year, to meet 1 percent of worldwide demand, and 70 plants of that size for all tire manufacturers worldwide to achieve 5-percent-recycled carbon black content in tire production, he said.

Pairing rubber and plastic. J’Lynn Hare, vice president of Rumber Materials (Muenster, Texas), and Scott Melton, president of ACI Plastics (Flint, Mich.), shared their companies’ experiences in “Mixing Scrap Plastic and Rubber to Improve Performance.” Rumber, which works as a substitute for wood or plastic, is made from 100-percent plastic and tire rubber ground down to 8 to 10 mesh combined with heat, pressure, and water, Hare said. She asserted that the firm’s product is stronger than other composites and impervious to fluids, mud, oil, and ultraviolet rays. The company manufactures composite material boards, sheets, and molded products. To ensure a high-quality manufactured product, develop a good relationship with plastics and rubber suppliers in order “to receive a consistent supply of high-quality, contaminant-free material,” she said. “It wasn’t until we started refusing loads that suppliers got on board.” The rubber must be dry and the plastic tested to ensure it has the correct density and melt index, she said.

Melton spoke about ACI Plastics’ challenges producing pellets from plastic and crumb rubber. Because the rubber doesn’t melt, the plastic must completely encapsulate the rubber, he said. The higher the rubber content, the tougher it is to pelletize because there is less plastic to wrap around the rubber, which also makes the pellets soft, Melton said. Production must control moisture (typically in the rubber), processing temperature, and rubber particle size. Facilities also must have good ventilation in the extrusion area to remove the smoke and odor from the burning rubber, Melton said.

Using crumb rubber reduces the cost of the polymer compound, he noted. It’s readily available and stretches the use of high-demand feedstock such as polypropylene. The firm prefers cryogenic crumb rubber over ambient because the particles tend to be cleaner, finer, and dryer, Melton said.

Minding Management Issues

Cash transactions draw scrutiny. The scrap recycling industry traditionally has been a cash business, but today there’s a perception among many in the banking industry, government, and the public that if you’re dealing in cash, you’re probably doing something illegal. The increased scrutiny of cash businesses stems from financial scandals as well as money-laundering activities from drug cartels, terrorists, organized crime syndicates, and others, and it’s having an adverse impact on scrap recyclers, said Ryan Rasske, president of RiskGap Advisors (Green Bay, Wis.), in “Working With Cash Transactions.”

Federal anti-money-laundering laws—part of the USA Patriot Act—put pressure on banks to ensure that their customers conduct only legal financial transactions. The banks can be fined if they fail to notice fraud. As a result, many financial institutions now look closely at their customers who deal mostly with cash to assess their risk factors and decide whether or not they want to continue doing business with such clients.

Scrap recyclers could be caught up in such scrutiny, but Rasske had several suggestions to help them build and maintain strong business relationships with their bankers. First, help the bank better understand the scrap industry and how it operates as a legitimate cash business—and do so before the bank comes to you to ask tough questions. “Put yourself in a better position by saying to your banker, ‘Look, I treasure this relationship with the bank, and I will give you complete transparency into my business so that we can keep this relationship going,’” Rasske said. When you do that, the bank is less likely to see your business as a risk, he added.

But banks can’t just turn customers away, he noted. A financial institution must show government regulators that it has done its due diligence in researching a prospective or current customer before denying a company the opportunity to do business.

A few attendees noted that because their companies conduct business with large cash transactions, the Transportation Security Administration (Arlington, Va.) has put company owners and employees on watch lists, and their financial institutions have scrutinized their personal bank accounts for possible fraud. “I find it invasive and offensive, and it makes me want to put all my cash in a mattress,” one attendee said.

Moderator Mark Lewon of Utah Metal Works said he doesn’t like that legitimate businesses are put in a position to prove they are innocent. Rasske agreed, saying the scrutiny can be invasive and that the pendulum of the federal government needs to swing the other way.

Working effectively with the media. Recyclers can use the media as a conduit to promote company news, educate the public, and dispel misconceptions about the industry, said Lenora Kaplan, president of Small Business Directions (Las Vegas), at the media relations training workshop. “The media needs you as much as you need them,” she said, but “being proactive is the only way to use the media to your advantage.” Proactive steps include becoming familiar with your target media and establishing relationships with reporters via phone, e-mail, social media, or in-person meetings. The recycling industry has many positive messages it can promote to the media, including its resource conservation and economic contributions, and it has two national holidays—America Recycles Day and Earth Day—to leverage for favorable media coverage. Kaplan also reviewed how to pitch a story to the media and how to give an effective interview, including what to wear (avoid brown or tan clothing and patterned apparel) and how to interact with a reporter to greatest effect (gestures are usually helpful and friendly, while confident facial expressions establish positive rapport). If a reporter asks a negative question, neutralize the negative point first, then follow with a positive comment.

Reducing export risk. Exporting is essential for many scrap companies, but how can they reduce the risks and offer the most favorable terms? The “Financial Instruments and Their Use in Exporting” session answered that question.

Alex Johnson of Euler Hermes North America (Owings Mills, Md.) named the many risks exporters face from the purchasing company, the foreign bank, unfulfilled contracts, or events in the buyer’s country. When selecting a payment method, options range from those that are most protective for the seller and most risky for the buyer, such as full payment in advance, to the opposite, an open account, which is most risky for the seller and least risky for the buyer. Too-restrictive terms could limit your sales opportunities, Johnson noted. The payment tool should depend on the circumstances of each sale.

He described the pros and cons of using payment terms on the two ends of the risk spectrum and gave examples of where they might be appropriate. For example, the open account is “a very competitive tool to get the best pricing and sell product quickly,” Johnson pointed out, and trade credit insurance can transfer some of the risk to a third party, especially in medium- to low-risk markets, where the seller faces commercial risk of nonpayment more than other possible risks. Insurance on foreign receivables also might allow the seller to borrow against those receivables, he added. Regardless of what payment terms you agree upon, he recommended getting a down payment so the buyer has some “skin in the game before you ship the product.”

Neal Weisenburger of Wells Fargo Bank (San Francisco) described tools in the middle of the risk spectrum, such as letters of credit and documentary collection, that mitigate some risk while giving sellers greater export competitiveness. The right tool will depend on your primary goal, he noted: risk mitigation, better liquidity management, or increased sales competitiveness.

Weisenburger emphasized the importance of ensuring a letter of credit is structured properly and free of errors and that you understand and can comply with its terms and conditions. Any errors or discrepancies, even minor ones, can give the buyer an opportunity to delay or withhold payment, he said, and “our experience is that 70 percent of [LC] documents have discrepancies.”

Hedging to manage risk. The scrap commodity market can be a volatile place, so some recyclers turn to hedging to cushion the risk that comes with fluctuating prices—but hedging can affect a scrap recycling operation whether or not it participates directly in the practice, explained speakers at the hedging workshop. Mark Weintraub, a trader and in-house counsel with Premier Metal Services (Cleveland), moderated the discussion with Glen Chalkley, head of electronic market development and membership for the London Metal Exchange (London), and John Peiser, senior vice president of metals for Jefferies Bache (New York).

The benefits of hedging, Chalkley said, include securing long-term fixed sales prices without exposing oneself to adverse price movements, improving cash flow in times of excess supply, and accessing supply when production stocks are low. There are potential downsides to hedging as well, he said, including lower profits, higher bank penalties and borrowing costs, and less efficient forecasting or planning.

The use of futures and options on futures to hedge metal production or metal consumption requests can be a useful strategy for scrap recyclers as it can allow those companies to be more competitive in the marketplace while also locking in long-term prices, Peiser said. Companies can hedge their budget or their inventory to manage the risk of price volatility, he added. Companies can also use options to bid on requests for quotes for commodities it wishes to purchase.

Peiser recommended taking a macro view when it comes to hedging: Make direct bets on specific metals to complement existing portfolios, provide overlays to protect equity and fixed income portfolios, and protect portfolios against dollar exposures.

A Keynote Speech With a Kick

Hillary Rodham Clinton—former U.S. secretary of state, U.S. senator from New York, and first lady—is used to parrying the slings and arrows political opponents aim her way. She also proved her prowess at dodging a shoe a protester threw at her during her keynote speech April 10. After making a few off-the-cuff jokes and pausing while the audience gave her a standing ovation, Clinton resumed her talk about environmental issues, describing the environmental projects of the Clinton Foundation and its Clinton Climate Initiative. She also praised the scrap recycling industry for providing the dual benefits of improving the environment while stimulating the economy. A question-and-answer session with ReMA Chair Jerry Simms covered wide-ranging topics that included today’s vitriolic political climate, Syria’s use of chemical weapons, U.S.-Israel relations, the Russia-Ukraine crisis, and the issue of free and fair trade. On that latter topic, Clinton advised appealing to the World Trade Organization, when possible, and using legal, regulatory, political, and advocacy tools to counter protective measures in other countries. The Q-and-A session also touched on U.S. manufacturing, China’s current challenges, and fighting discrimination against women around the world, which Clinton says is one of her “great causes.”

Auction Raises Funds for Research, Scholarships

The Recycling Research Foundation raised almost $14,000 in its annual silent auction, held April 7-9 on the exposition floor. The 24 items up for bid included a quilt, Bose headphones, a basketball signed by Michael Jordan, a humidor, a desktop computer, a Vera Bradley luggage set, a VIP stay at the Mandalay Bay, and ads in trade publications (including Scrap). The item that fetched the highest bid—a Roll-Rite tarp—brought in $3,950 for RRF, which will use the proceeds to fund its recycling-related research projects and academic scholarships. For more information or to donate items to the next RRF silent auction—at ISRI’s 2015 convention in Vancouver, British Columbia—contact Tom Crane, 202/662-8536 or tomcrane@isri.org.

Dell Earns DFR Honor

ISRI presented Dell (Round Rock, Texas) with the 2014 Design for Recycling® Award, which recognizes products manufactured with recycling in mind. The award honored Dell’s Latitude E7240 laptop and two of its tablets—the Latitude 10 and XPS 10—which feature modular designs, clearly labeled parts for easy identification, minimal use of adhesives, and convenient disassembly guides. Representatives from Dell accepted the award April 10 at the convention’s final general session.

To be eligible for the DFR award, a product must be designed/redesigned and manufactured to contain the maximum amount of recyclable materials; be easily recycled using current or newly designed recycling processes and procedures; be cost effective to recycle so the cost to recycle does not exceed the value of its recycled materials; be free of hazardous materials that are not recyclable or impede the recycling process; minimize the time and cost involved to recycle the product; reduce the use of raw materials by including recycled materials and/or components; and have a net gain in the overall recyclability of the product while reducing the overall negative impact on the environment.

ISRI Recognizes Poster, Video Contest Winners

ISRI and JASON Learning (Mystic, Conn.) recognized the winners of their first joint contest, which encouraged U.S. students in grades K-12 to create a poster or video promoting cell-phone recycling. The contest challenged students to submit an original poster or video in the style of a public service announcement that would convince people to recycle rather than discard their old cell phones. Leanza Toves, a seventh-grader at Kapolei Middle School (Kapolei, Hawaii), won the poster contest, while home-schooled siblings Marlowe and Ahnika Lexvold from South Haven, Minn., won the video competition. The winners received a trip for themselves and a parent or guardian to the convention. They and the seven other finalists also received a certificate, a year of JASON online access for the entrants and a parent or teacher/facilitator, and a contest T-shirt. Three entrants who won honorable mentions received certificates and T-shirts.

Judges evaluated entries on their interpretation of the theme, its clarity to the viewer, the persuasiveness of the message, creativity and originality, and the entry’s quality and overall impression. View the winning and finalist videos and posters at www.isri.org. Click on About ISRI, Awards, and Youth Video and Poster Contest.

ISRI Salutes Transportation Safety Excellence

Harry Squires of Schnitzer Steel Industries (Portland, Ore.) received ISRI’s Safe Driver of the Year Award for operating his entire 39-year career to date—nearly 2.5 million miles on the road—without a preventable accident. The award, now in its second year, recognizes individuals who have driven a commercial vehicle for at least 20 years without a preventable accident. Other criteria include the driver’s contribution to highway safety through training, letters of appreciation, deeds of heroism on or off the job, and membership in civic and fraternal organizations.

In addition to receiving complimentary travel to and lodging at the convention, Squires received a crystal truck trophy, personalized certificate, ReMA Safe Driver leather jacket, congratulatory letter, and $500 check. Bill Willis of Grossman Iron & Steel Co. (St. Louis)—recipient of the 2013 Safe Driver of the Year Award—placed second this year, and Joseph Romeyn Jr. of PADNOS (Holland, Mich.) came in third. Squires received the award April 8 at the convention’s opening general session.

ISRI also recognized the other winners of its transportation safety awards for their outstanding commitment to the safety of their employees and the general public through progressive and effective fleet safety programs. The Best Fleet Award goes to the ReMA member with the lowest vehicle accident rate and lowest U.S. Department of Transportation recordable accident rate in 2013. The Pacesetter Award uses the same criteria as the Best Fleet Award but covers the most recent three calendar years (in this case, Jan. 1, 2011, to Dec. 31, 2013). This year’s recipients based on fleet classes are:

Best Fleet Award
  Small Fleet (300,000 to 500,000 miles): Schnitzer Steel Industries (Tacoma, Wash.).
  Intermediate Fleet (500,001 to 1 million miles): Consolidated Scrap Resources (York, Pa.).
  Medium Fleet (1,000,001 to 5 million miles): Metal Exchange Corp. (St. Louis).
  Large Fleet (more than 5 million miles): OmniSource Transport (Fort Wayne, Ind.).

Pacesetter Award
  Small Fleet (300,000 to 500,000 miles): Berman Brothers (Jacksonville, Fla.).
  Intermediate Fleet (500,001 to 1 million miles): Consolidated Scrap Resources (York, Pa.).
  Medium Fleet (1,000,001 to 5 million miles): Metal Exchange Corp. (St. Louis).
  Large Fleet (more than 5 million miles): OmniSource Transport (Fort Wayne, Ind.).

Three Recyclers Honored for Lifetime Achievement

ISRI honored Stanley Kramer, Howard Meyers, and Sandy Shapiro with its Lifetime Achievement Award for their outstanding service to the association, its predecessor organizations, the industry, and their communities.

Kramer, chairman of Kramer Metals (Los Angeles), left school in the early 1950s to join his brother, Howard, in the family’s scrap business. In the late 1950s, after his return from military service, Kramer and his brother steadily transformed the small business into a full-service scrap recycling operation and purchased their first yard in 1967. Soon thereafter, Kramer got involved in the Institute of Scrap Iron and Steel, an ReMA predecessor, and later ISRI. He served in all leadership positions in the Southwestern Chapter and as vice chair of ISRI’s convention committee, chair of ISRI’s chapter presidents committee, and in numerous other leadership positions.

Howard Meyers of Quexco (Dallas) began working at Revere Smelting & Refining (Middletown, N.Y.) while attending college. In 1970, he purchased the company and became its president and CEO. Throughout the 1970s, he transformed his Revere purchase into a holding company, Quexco, which today operates 17 nonferrous smelting and refining facilities, three anode and flat-rolled production facilities, and a variety of plastic-related and mining businesses around the globe. Meyers was instrumental in forging the 1987 merger between ISIS and the National Association of Recycling Industries, ISRI’s other predecessor organization. He served as NARI’s last president as well as co-president of the newly formed ReMA with Sandy Shapiro.

After attending the University of Maryland (College Park, Md.) and serving in the Air Force Reserve, Shapiro joined his family’s scrap business, Cambridge Iron & Metal (Baltimore), and helped the company grow even as he became active in association work. In ISIS he served as president of its Seaboard Chapter from 1976 to 1978 and chair of its public relations committee beginning in 1978. In 1984 he was elected first vice president of ISIS; in 1986 he became president. He worked closely with representatives of NARI, including Howard Meyers, to merge the two associations to form ISRI. He also was among the association leaders who negotiated the purchase of Scrap Age magazine, which became ISRI’s official publication, Scrap.

Tire Chapter Honors Daughtrey

ISRI’s Scrap Tire Processors Chapter presented Tommy Daughtrey, president of Four D Corp. (Duncan, Okla.), with its Service to Industry Award. Daughtrey, his brother, and their father started Four D in 1994. In ISRI, he has served twice as treasurer of the scrap tire processors chapter and twice as a director of the Tire and Rubber Division. He currently serves as the division’s chair and a member of ISRI’s government affairs and finance committees.

To receive the Service to Industry Award, Daughtrey had to participate in or continually volunteer for chapter projects and initiatives, serve in a leadership position (either as a board officer or committee chair), volunteer to present at the ReMA convention or a Scrap Tire Processors Chapter event, be a tire chapter member for three or more years, advance ReMA and the tire chapter when attending non-ISRI events, recruit one or more companies to join the tire chapter, and be well-respected in the industry. Daughtrey received the award April 8 as part of the convention’s tires/rubber spotlight.

Recycler Proves His Mettle and Earns Some Metal

Michael Parsons of Bedford Recycling (Bedford, Ind.) won the “Guess the Shred” contest at the Magnatech Engineering (Tonganoxie, Kan.) booth at the ReMA exposition, which challenged conventiongoers to guess how many shredded aluminum cans were in a Plexiglas box that measured 2 feet by 2 feet by 8 feet. The prize? A 10-ounce solid silver bar of 0.999 purity. Parsons beat several hundred other contestants with his guess that the box contained 16,000 cans—coming closest to the actual count of 15,561. Magnatech held the contest to promote its new scrapyard profitability program.