WM Diverts C&D Debris from Landfill in California
Waste Management has announced that its construction and demolition (C&D) recycling facility at the Simi Valley Landfill in Simi Valley, Calif., has processed more than 24,000 tons of C&D material since it opened in January 2008.
The material collected at the Waste Management facility includes wood, concrete, dirt, drywall, metal, cardboard, plastic, roofing material, carpet, appliances and tile. These materials are sorted and transported to regional facilities.
To date, materials collected and recycled include:
• Metal: 1.7 million pounds
• Cardboard and Plastic: 437,800 pounds
• Drywall: 631,380 pounds
• Wood: 13,423 pounds
"We are so proud that we’ve been able to partner with the community and local contractors to ensure that C&D materials have been recycled instead of landfilled," says Mike Smith, market area general manager for Waste Management of Ventura County.
Economy Takes Toll on Construction
Construction employment dropped in September and the situation will get worse unless credit markets reopen, says Ken Simonson, chief economist for the Associated General Contractors of America (AGC), commenting on a Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report issued in October that showed construction lost 35,000 jobs."State governments from California to Maine have been shut out of the bond market, while developers have had bank credit windows slammed shut on their fingers as they reached for loans," Simonson says. "All types of construction shed workers in September, following an uptick in nonresidential hiring in August. Another ominous sign is that architectural and engineering services employment—a harbinger of demand for future construction—rose until recently, but stalled this summer and fell in September."
Compounding the bad news is the report that private nonresidential construction spending fell nearly 1 percent in both July and August. "State and local spending was up, but I hear that will change as more states each week announce budget shortfalls," Simonson says. "Highways and schools—60 percent of public construction spending—are in particular jeopardy because of drops in fuel and property taxes."
Even private categories with the best chance of growth, like power plants and hospitals, have slowed. "The 2009 construction employment and spending outlook will be very bleak unless credit markets revive promptly."
Massachusetts Recycler Files Suit Against C&D Burning Ban
New England Recycling (NER), a Taunton, Mass.-based mixed C&D recycling company, has filed a lawsuit against the state of New Hampshire over its laws that prevent burning C&D material.
The suit was filed Sept. 12 by NER and the CMRA Issues & Education Fund, the advocacy arm of the Construction Materials Recycling Association. The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Concord against the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Service Commissioner Thomas Burack and Attorney General Kelly Ayotte, claiming they are enforcing unconstitutional legislation.
The suit claims that the ban effectively stops the import of fuels derived from C&D material in violation of the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which reserves the right to regulate interstate commerce to the federal government, according to attorney Lee Blais of the Mansfield, Mass.-based firm Blais & Parent.
The laws at the center of the suit began as temporary moratoriums on the burning of wood fuel derived from mixed C&D material that began in 2005, which were put in place following the legal struggle over permitting issues involving Bio Energy, a Hopkinton, N.H.-based plant that burns wood fuel to generate electricity.
A permanent ban on the burning of C&D material was signed into law by New Hampshire Gov. John Lynch in June 2007 and took effect as of Jan. 1, 2008. The suit claims these laws restrict interstate commerce by effectively impeding the importation of fuel derived from C&D material for the "protection of the failing New Hampshire virgin wood industry" and "keeping New Hampshire from becoming the ‘dumping ground’ of the Northeast."
The suit also claims the logic behind banning the material over environmental concerns is flawed, maintaining that C&D fuel can be burned safely. The suit cites studies conducted by the Environmental Research Group of the University of New Hampshire that concluded C&D fuel can be burned safely.
"The University of New Hampshire studied the C&D issue and came out with research that demonstrated there was no negative environmental impact," Blais says. "This fear is totally misplaced."
Emerald Waste Services Acquires WM’s Central Florida Assets
Emerald Waste Services LLC, a WHI Capital Partners portfolio company, has acquired Waste Management Inc. of Florida’s municipal solid waste (MSW) collection routes in and around Gainesville, Fla., Volusia County, Fla., and around Tallahassee, Fla. The transaction also includes the purchase of a transfer station in Gainesville.The transaction diversifies its revenue base and expands its service territory, which now runs from Pascagoula, Miss., to Daytona Beach, Fla.
In the transaction with WMI, EWS has acquired 77 residential MSW collection routes across 16 municipalities in North and Central Florida, as well as 17 commercial MSW routes in the territory. Along with its existing MSW collection contracts, EWS now services more than 118,000 residential customers and 27,000 commercial customers, and generates about 70 percent of its revenues from MSW collection routes. EWS’ service territory now covers 40 counties across three states.
To complement its MSW operations, EWS owns and operates 10 landfills and is the largest owner of C&D landfill space in the Gulf Coast region stretching from southeast Mississippi to northwest Florida. EWS’ service area continues to experience strong population growth, commercial real estate development and expanding military facilities. "In two and a half years, we have successfully built an outstanding business that is well positioned to benefit from the future growth of the region," says EWS CEO Bart Begley. "The WMI acquisition is an important strategic milestone as we continue to build our MSW operations, both in disposal and collection."
"The combination of EWS’ existing landfill capacity and hauling operations with the acquired WMI assets and contracts provides us with an ideal revenue mix between MSW and C&D," says WHI Capital Partners’ Managing Partner Adam Schecter. "We will continue to aggressively grow this platform both organically as well as through strategic acquisition opportunities that our team has identified." C&DR
Explore the November 2008 Issue
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