"Innovations" Case Studies: Commercial Innovations and Challenges

Case Studies

• King County, Washington, Department of Natural Resources Solid Waste Division
• Santa Clara Valley Manufacturing Group (SCVMG)
• City and County of San Francisco Solid Waste Management Program
• City of Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation Solid Resources Citywide Recycling Division
• Alameda County Waste Management Authority and Recycling Board (ACWMA)

King County, Washington, Department of Natural Resources Solid Waste Division

Business Assistance Team. Offers technical assistance on where to recycle materials and where to buy recycled-content products; provides general related educational material. The business assistance team provides technical assistance in reducing packaging waste and industry-specific information related to using cost-effective packaging. The team provides case studies and other education materials and invitations to join roundtable discussions with industry peers. Free technical assistance is available for construction sites, offices, manufacturing facilities, hospitals, and more.

Recycled-Content Paper For Less. The solid waste division provides information about a nonprofit recycled products purchasing cooperative.

Small Business Cooperatives. The division provides information about small business recycling cooperatives to overcome the difficulty that small business generators have in finding a recycler willing to serve them at reasonable cost.

Reusable Building Material Exchange. The solid waste division operates a service that provides a convenient way for contractors and home remodelers to exchange small or large quantities of reusable or surplus building materials.

Santa Clara Valley Manufacturing Group (SCVMG)

This group engages in a “cooperative effort with local government to identify and address major public policy issues affecting the economic health and quality of life in Silicon Valley.” Organized in 1978, this group is primarily a business coalition. It serves as an important model of public-private cooperation. The SCVMG has a solid waste task force composed of both public and private participants. To the traditional 3R hierarchy of reduce, reuse, and recycle, they have added buy recycled and manufacture (using pre- and postconsumer materials).

Solid Waste Task Force

This task force was activated in the early 1980s to investigate how member companies could reduce waste entering Santa Clara County landfills. The members conducted a study in 1983-84 that concluded that 60 to 70 percent of the landfilled waste in the county was generated by commercial and industrial sources. Before the passage of the IWMA in California mandating waste diversion from landfills, the group produced a “Guide to Commercial Recycling” that was updated most recently in 1997 and has won several awards.

The task force, working with the Mid-Peninsula Environmental Education Alliance, instituted recycling programs in Santa Clara and San Mateo County schools. In the end, 20 schools implemented programs with the assistance of 31 businesses. The group also published the award-winning “Recycling Partnership for Schools & Business, A How-To Handbook.” The task force hosted a number of workshops to educate local businesses about the benefits of recycling, solid waste/source reduction, and how to handle hard-to-recycle items.

In a 1996 survey of member companies, the SCVMG indicated that the following wide variety of materials were recycled:

Survey respondents reportedly recycled up to 97 percent of their solid waste, with the average being 51 percent. In 1995, nearly 75,000 tons of waste was recycled.

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City and County of San Francisco Solid Waste Management Program

The recycling budget of San Francisco is approximately $2.5 million annually. The program offers a wide range of services to all classes of waste generators. Of particular interest is their grant program.

San Francisco Waste Prevention and Recycling Grants

For the grant cycle years 1997-98 and 1998-99, approximately $550,000 and $560,000 were awarded respectively.

• In 1997-98, 18 grants were awarded ranging from $3,978 to $99,000, with an average of $30,570.
• In 1998-99, 11 grants were awarded ranging from $9,460 to $128,000, with an average of $50,930.

The trend toward awarding higher grants to fewer recipients may be reflective of the increasing complexity of moving forward in reducing subsequent increments of waste. Following are examples of grant-funded projects related to the ICI waste streams:

1997-98

• Expanding wood diversion through pallet reuse and repair.
• Increasing building material reuse by expanding community and low-income renovations.
• Improving campus recycling and capturing up to 50 percent of paper generated.
• Matching a wide range of donated equipment, furnishings, and other reusables with nonprofit organizations.
• Recovering reusable furnishings and installing them at social service agencies.
• Conducting waste assessments and follow-up visits at hotels and City College of San Francisco campuses, and instituting an in-vessel composting program at the Phelan Campus.
• Testing paper and organics separation and improving materials handling systems at city litter cleanups.
• Salvaging additional produce and other food and distributing it to meal programs.
• Diverting redwood lumber to gardens and providing zero-waste gardening education.
• Installing can crushers at all three of the city’s school district production kitchens, and recycling food cans and corrugated cartons.
• Collecting usable medical equipment and supplies from San Francisco health facilities and distributing it to Latin America.

1998-99

• Conducting commercial waste assessments and team-based follow-through at small and medium-sized San Francisco businesses.
• Increasing the reuse and recycling of computer monitors, terminals, and television tubes.
• Producing veneer and lumber from felled San Francisco trees.
• Recovering reusable furnishings and installing them at social service agencies.
• Improving and expanding building deconstruction and material reuse.
• Operating a recycling and reuse drop-off center and conducting waste assessments in the Presidio.
• Salvaging additional perishable and other food and distributing it to meal programs.

Several programs received grants in both years, indicating a level of commitment by the city to keep successful programs operating.

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City of Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation Solid Resources Citywide Recycling Division

This division offers a full range of waste reduction services to its community. Of particular interest is the city’s program for recycling construction, demolition, and land-clearing materials. Since 1992 the division has conducted a program to provide technical assistance, educational outreach, and best management practices for recycling of C&D material. Their outreach efforts focused on three areas:

1. City departments.
2. Private sector building industy and interaction with industry organizations such as the Construction Specifications Institute.
3. Resources, including the Building Industry Tool Kit, and publications, such as the Sustainable Building Reference Manual.

The Building Industry Tool Kit is composed of the following items:

• CalMAX-the CIWMB materials exchange catalog/database for business reuse and recycling.
• Recycling Resource Catalog.
• Construction and Demolition Waste Recycling Guide (lists more than 115 companies).
• Wood You Recycle?
• A Resource Guide to Recycled Content Construction Products (lists more than 125 manufacturers).
• Solid Resources Management Specification.
• SRCRD fact sheet.

These last two publications were distributed to more than 5,000 developers, C&D contractors, architects, specifiers, and other governmental agencies. For its excellent program related to C&D waste reduction, SRCRD has received awards from the following organizations and agencies:

• American Institute of Architects
• Construction Specifications Institute
• California Integrated Waste Management Board
• Los Angeles Productivity Commission
• Los Angeles Board of Public Works

Alameda County Waste Management Authority and Recycling Board (ACWMA)

Background

The ACWMA is a joint powers agency comprised of the following agencies:

The ACWMA operates in conjunction with the Alameda County Source Reduction and Recycling Board created through the passage of a ballot initiative, Measure D, in 1990. The 11-member board is comprised of six experts in the waste prevention field appointed by the county board of supervisors and five elected public officials appointed by the ACWMA.

The recycling board is funded by a surcharge on tonnage disposed at the Altamont and Vasco Road landfills, expected to generate $7.9 million during FY 1999-2000. Half of annual revenues are passed through to the member cities for their waste reduction programs.

The ACWMA is funded by a $1.50 per ton surcharge at Alameda County landfills. Other funding sources include mitigation fees of $4.52 and $4.53 per ton for waste imported from the City and County of San Francisco and other locations outside of Alameda County, respectively. Together with other miscellaneous income, ACWMA anticipates revenues of $7.5 million for FY 1999-2000. The ACWMA operates a wide range of programs related to waste reduction of the ICI waste stream.

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Alameda County Source Reduction and Recycling Board Grant Program

Funded from Measure D, the program is designed to foster reduction of materials going to the landfill. In 1999, seven grants were awarded for a total of $651,319. Of these, six were related to ICI wastes:

1. Expansion of salvaged food-sorting operations for food banks.
2. Expansion of construction materials programs for salvage, reuse, and recycling.
3. Food waste collection and composting operations.
4. Development of small dimension lumber remilling.
5. Expansion of institutional waste diversion services.
6. Expanded utilization of recycled plastics in landscape edging products.

In 2000, the board approved 10 grants for a total of $1,015,925 and three additional grants from other funding sources. Of these, nine were related to ICI wastes:

1. Development of a tree recycling pickup and drop-off site.
2. Development of a mattress recycling facility.
3. Expansion of a computer reuse warehouse.
4. Expansion of a computer recycling project.
5. Expansion of a C&D diversion program.
6. Expansion of the second chance project for collection and resale of bulky waste items.
7. Expansion of a tire grinding and recycling facility.
8. Market development for a materials exchange facility.
9. Relocation for a materials reuse facility.

Alameda County Source Reduction and Recycling Board Revolving Loan Fund (RLF)

This fund was approved and established in 1993 to provide supplemental financing to small and medium-sized businesses in Alameda County that are engaged in the source reduction and recycling industry. The RLF is one of the only funds dedicated solely to recycling and source reduction ever to be established by a local government agency in California. The RLF is jointly administered with the Materials for the Future Foundation.

The RLF has made 23 loans since its inception, for a total of $2,509,000. This amount leveraged an additional $5.7 million. To date, there is a zero loan loss rate, no delinquencies, and three loans have been repaid in full. Loans ranged from $15,000 to $200,000, with an average of approximately $109,000. The loans have been used for:

1. Equipment
2. Working capital
3. Real estate

Projects of the recipients include:

• Yard waste processing.
• Bulk bag reprocessing and recycling.
• Recovery of medical products.
• Salvage and recycling of demolition lumber.
• Tree service.
• Recycled-content plastic products.
• Oil recycling products.
• Cast glass manufacturing.
• Automated plastic recycling process.
• Manufacture of paper tubes and cores.
• Steel foundry.
• Custom plastics manufacturing.
• Custom steel foundry.
• Paper collection and processing.
• Plastic bag manufacturing.
• Office furniture from recycled material.
• Marketing green waste products.
• Wood products.

The StopWaste Partnership

The Comprehensive Environmental Assessment Program (StopWaste) is one of the ACWMA’s business and public agency services. It has been described as a free non-regulatory technical assistance initiative. Its budget mission statement notes that the partnership:

“Provides comprehensive environmental performance assessment and improvement services focusing on source reduction, recycling, energy and water conservation, wastewater discharge reduction and efficient use of materials. Service are generally targeted to companies and institutions in Alameda County with over 75 employees.” See CIWMB Publication #310-02-012, “Solid Waste Assessments: A Model for Local Government Recycling and Waste Reduction,” for more information about waste auditing.

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Last updated: November 01, 2007