Mixed C&D

Hanover County, North Carolina, C&D recycling facility opens

New Hanover County, North Carolina, officially opened its new Construction and Demolition (C&D) Debris Facility in Wilmington, North Carolina, July 7, 2016, at a ribbon cutting ceremony with several state and local officials.

The facility was approved by the board of commissioners in 2015 to increase debris recycling.

The $1.8 million dollar project accepts material such as wood, asphalt shingles, concrete and bricks.

The new facility is expected to extend the life of the county’s current landfill by 20 years by keeping an estimated 60,000 tons of C&D material out of the county landfill.

The system was designed to process 30 tons of construction and demolition materials per hour.

Prior to the new facility, C&D materials were dumped onto a concrete pad, employees would sort through the pile by hand and look for recoverable materials. The debris consumed around 30 percent of the landfill space.

Since August 2014, disposal fees have been waived for C&D materials that are sorted at the job site and are 100 percent free of contamination.

Waste Management increases revenue and appoints new president

Houston-based Waste Management Inc. (WM) says its revenue for the second quarter of 2016 was $3.43 billion compared with $3.32 billion in the second quarter of 2015. Net income for the recently concluded quarter was $287 million, or 64 cents per share, compared with net income of $274 million, or 60 cents per share, for the second quarter of 2015.

In addition to releasing its quarterly financial results, WM also announced that its board of directors has appointed James C. (Jim) Fish Jr. to the position of president, reporting to CEO David Steiner. Fish retains his existing role as chief financial officer (CFO) while the company conducts a search to fill that role.

In the quarter, WM’s overall revenue increased by 3.3 percent, or by $110 million, with the company saying the increase “was driven by positive yield and volume in the company’s collection and disposal business of $98 million.”

What WM calls “traditional solid waste business” internal revenue growth from volume was up 0.8 percent in the second quarter of 2016. Total company internal revenue growth from volume was just 0.4 percent in the second quarter, “with lower recycling volumes accounting for the 40 basis point difference,” according to WM.

Average recycling commodity prices increased 2.3 percent in the second quarter of 2016 from the prior-year period, but recycling volumes declined 2.9 percent.

Results in the company’s recycling line of business improved by about 1 cent per diluted share compared with last year.

Fish “will maintain his responsibility for all financial affairs for WM, including treasury, audit, accounting, financial planning, tax and investor relations,” says WM. “He will also continue to oversee the information technology group and several of the company’s growth areas, including strategic business development and the company’s organic growth group.”

Fish, joined WM in 2001, holding positions including senior vice president of the company’s eastern group, vice president of price management and director of financial planning and analysis.

Franchise agreement faces questions in Las Vegas

Haulers of construction and demolition (C&D) materials in and around Las Vegas say the structure of a 20-year franchise agreement has left them in a poor position to compete with Phoenix-based Republic Services Inc., the landfill owner holding that franchise.

An online article by the Las Vegas Review-Journal quotes several C&D haulers who have begun to haul their materials some 100 miles away in order to avoid paying tip fees at the local franchised landfill.

The 20-year agreement is between Clark County, Nevada, which includes Las Vegas, and the Apex Landfill, which is owned by Republic Services.

A source of ill will within the franchise agreement has been an amendment in the agreement that “allows Republic Services to compete with companies in the private C&D market while simultaneously allowing Republic Services to set its own rates for competitors at its Apex landfill,” according to the newspaper.

The Apex Landfill is the only one in Clark County, and the franchise agreement holds that Republic Services has the “sole right to set and collect tipping fees” there.

According to the Review-Journal, “Republic Services has an internal rate that it charges itself for disposing of waste into the landfill, but Clark County doesn’t know what that rate is. The posted gate rate for other companies is $37.54 per ton.”

C&D haulers quoted in the article say they have been instead sending trucks on a 70-plus mile drive to the Western Elite Landfill in Lincoln County, Nevada, but they say it is a business model that can be difficult to sustain.

A Clark County employee quoted in the article expressed concern about the loss of materials volume to the Western Elite Landfill, noting that Clark County receives a fixed percentage of the Apex Landfill tipping fees.