Landfill operators are required to capture and control landfill gas (LFG) as part of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) New Source Performance Standards (NSPS). These rules are focused on reducing emissions of methane-rich landfill gas from new, modified and reconstructed municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills. The regulations require that landfills perform surface emission monitoring (SEM) to identify potential emission exceedances. Several technologies are used for conducting SEM, including flame ionization detectors (FIDs) and photoionization detectors (PIDs); however, new tunable diode laser absorption spectroscopy (TDLAS) technology can provide several advantages over other options.

Emissions monitoring requirements

EPA’s NSPS regulations require MSW landfills to operate a gas control and collection system (GCCS) to minimize methane emissions. The regulations require that landfills perform quarterly SEM to identify potential emissions greater than 500 parts per million by volume (ppmv). Operators must also ensure that their collection and control system is operating properly. If an exceedance is detected, the landfill must take whatever steps are necessary to correct the issue.

The instruments that can be used for this quarterly SEM are regulated by EPA’s guidance, “Method 21 Determination of Volatile Organic Compound Leaks.” With regards to instrument specifications, the guidance requires that the instrument must:

• Respond to the compounds being processed—in this case, methane.
• Be capable of measuring the leak definition concentration specified in the regulation.
• Have an instrument scale that is to +/- 2.5 percent of the specified concentration.
• Be equipped with an electrically driven pump to ensure that the sample is delivered to the detector at a constant flow rate.
• Be equipped with a probe or probe extension for sampling not to exceed 1.25 inches in outside diameter, with a single opening for admission of the sample.
• Be intrinsically safe for operation in explosive atmospheres.
• Have a response time equal to, or less than, 30 seconds.

Technologies for conducting SEM monitoring

Method 21 states that several technologies are suitable for SEM. Acceptable devices include, but aren’t limited to, those capable of catalytic oxidation, flame ionization, infrared absorption, and photoionization.

Historically, flame ionization detectors (FIDs) are generally accepted as the standard technology for SEM. A FID operates by detecting ions formed during the combustion of organic compounds in a hydrogen flame. The generation of these ions is proportional to the concentration of organic species in the sample gas stream.

While there are advantages to using FIDs, there are also a number of disadvantages. FIDs use an open flame, and there is a risk of flame out. When that happens, FIDs can be difficult to restart. Technicians must carry around bottled hydrogen, which can be difficult to obtain and transport. Hydrogen is highly flammable and cannot be shipped to locations like standard calibration gases can, so it must be obtained locally.

FIDs can also be heavy, with some weighing as much as 12 pounds. While that may not seem like a lot, carrying these around a landfill all day, even in a backpack, can create strain and fatigue for operators.

Many detection methods require the use of two separate devices—one to take the sample and one to save the data and the GPS coordinates, which must be reported along with the sample. Among other considerations, this means technicians must track the status of two batteries to be sure each is charged and ready to use.

TDLAS technology offers versatility and convenience to help landfill operators meet the EPA’s SEM requirements without the drawbacks of other technologies.

Finally, FIDs can read a wide range of hydrocarbons, but they can be susceptible to a cross-gas effect where you get false readings due to, or influenced by, the presence of other gases or hydrocarbons.

Another technology that can be used for SEM is the photoionization detector (PID), which uses high-energy photons in the ultraviolet (UV) range to break molecules into positively charged ions. As compounds enter the detector, they are bombarded by high-energy UV photons and are ionized when they absorb the UV light, resulting in ejection of electrons and the formation of positively charged ions. The ions produce an electric current, which is the signal output of the detector. The greater the concentration of the component, the more ions are produced, and the greater the current. The current is amplified and displayed on an ammeter or digital concentration display.

PIDs can detect multiple gases and are commonly used to detect volatile organic compounds (VOCs). They have a rapid response time but require frequent cleaning. In addition, the UV lamps wear out and require replacement.

A more recent SEM technology uses TDLAS, a combination of laser absorption spectrometry and applied electronic signals. An electronic signal is applied to increase the accuracy of the laser tuning range, which means the device can focus on the methane only within the spectrum of the sample. The device filters out any other VOCs so that they will not register and cannot influence or affect the methane concentration readings.

A true laser-based device offers many features over other technologies. First is accuracy, as these can detect readings down to 0.5 ppm. Additionally, no flame is required, which is a significant benefit for sampling in a potentially explosive environment. No external gas bottle is required for operation, and the laser technology also eliminates the risk of flame out, so the user does not lose time stopping and relighting. By including integrated GPS and Bluetooth, a well-designed TDLAS instrument can also eliminate the need for a secondary device for data storage and GPS. With proper internal storage, the detector can hold up to 480 hours of scan data, or roughly 3 months of data, before it must be downloaded. TDLAS design also allows for a weight that is less than half that of other SEM monitoring options, which is easier for the operator.

Both TDLAS instruments and software can help the user remain compliant with environmental regulations. Readings can be saved to a computer, and tools such as user-selectable reporting functions, accessible site maps and scan paths, and customizable indicator points based on the scan are available. These software programs can also format the scan data and autofill industry-standard background reports to make the job easier for operators.

An effort to improve SEM results

Efforts to capture, control and measure excess landfill gases are critically important given current regulations governing landfill emissions. And while SEM is required by the EPA, not all technologies approved to perform SEM are equal. New laser-based technology can help operators meet and exceed EPA Method 21 requirements for quarterly SEM monitoring. This TDLAS technology offers versatility and convenience to help landfill operators meet the EPA’s SEM requirements without experiencing the drawbacks of other technologies in terms of safety, efficiency and ease of use.

Dustin Pickering is an environmental products application specialist for QED Environmental Systems Inc. He can be reached at DPickering@qedenv.com.

Municipal governments and the public might strongly support residential recycling, but they might not fully understand how commodity markets work in the recycling industry. They sometimes have misconceptions about the value of commodities processed by material recovery facilities (MRFs).

In February 2020, Recycling Today talked with Phoenix-based Republic Services’ Richard Coupland, vice president of municipal sales, about some of these commodity value misconceptions and trends in municipal recycling programs. Coupland said he noticed that these misconceptions became apparent after China initiated its National Sword policy in 2018.

“Kind of the root challenge that China’s decision has created is an economic one,” Coupland said. “What I mean by that is the recycling contracts and the recycling programs in America were originally based on two simple premises. One of them was that we didn’t want to charge the resident very much to begin to recycle. … So, we undercharged the resident because we were able to sell the recyclables in the market for a really good return, and a lot of people think that people in the industry were making tons of money.”

He continued, “The reality was they were making revenue, but we needed to pay back the drivers and operations. That’s kind of a myth we created for the public—that recycling was free and tons of money [could] be made doing it.”

But, Coupland said, recycling isn’t free, and commodity values for recovered paper, in particular, were at a near all-time low at the time Recycling Today talked to him in 2020.

Some groups have been working to clear up the confusion municipalities and the public have regarding commodity values. In particular, the Northeast Recycling Council (NERC), Brattleboro, Vermont, developed a quarterly “Report on Blended Commodity Values in the Northeast” in 2019 as a way to give municipalities insight into regional market trends.

“The thinking at the time was that it would be helpful to dispel some of the concerns about the value of materials and put to rest some of the distrust from municipalities working with [MRFs],” says Lynn Rubinstein, who is the executive director at NERC.

NERC surveys nearly 20 publicly owned or operated MRFs in the Northeast and mid-Atlantic region for the report. NERC says these respondents operate single-stream, dual-stream and source-separated MRFs.

Digging into data

According to NERC’s quarterly report for July 1 to Sept. 30, 2020, MRFs reported a decrease in the overall value of curbside recyclables compared with the previous quarter. In the third quarter, the average commodity value per ton with the expense of handling residuals was $40.19. Without residuals, the average commodity value per ton was $46.83. NERC reports that these values are down about 21 percent compared with the second quarter of 2020, when the average commodity value per ton with residuals was $51.23, while the price per ton without residuals was $59.58.

Rubinstein says the overall blended MRF commodity value has ebbed and flowed since NERC started surveying MRFs in 2019. She adds that it has been difficult to determine a clear pattern or trend related to these quarterly values in the region.

"The data proves to those less directly engaged in the [recycling] marketplace that these materials do have value.” – Lynn Rubinstein, executive director, Northeast Recycling Council, says of the group’s blended commodity value report

“The trend is that there is no trend,” she says. “Values go up, values go down.”

NERC’s latest report also indicates that the average processing cost for MRFs was $84 per ton, down slightly from the previous quarter but up 1 percent from when NERC’s survey began more than a year ago. The data on processing costs also seems to fluctuate with each survey, but Rubinstein says this data has been less variable than the commodity value data.

While patterns can be hard to spot in its surveys, Rubinstein says she thinks the data NERC is gathering can be interesting to share with municipalities in the Northeast, proving that recyclables do have value. She says municipalities also can pull out some more specific data to see that recovered paper prices did indeed increase in 2020 or that some plastic scrap prices have been doing well.

“It’s still interesting data—it’s a conversation starter,” Rubinstein says. “The data proves to those less directly engaged in the [recycling] marketplace that these materials do have value. On the other hand, it’s been interesting and valuable to be able to see these fluctuations and see what is happening within our region. All regions are different, but to be able to watch and see how [markets] evolve is very interesting and [is a] great value to state regulators in particular.”

Overall on the up

Looking beyond the Northeast, sources tell Recycling Today that values for most recyclables recovered at MRFs increased in 2020 compared with 2019.

“This year has actually been a much better year than the past few years for pricing,” says Anne Germain, who is the COO and senior vice president of technical and regulatory affairs at the National Waste & Recycling Association.

By weight, she says, the majority of material in residential recycling carts is recovered paper, including mixed paper and old corrugated containers (OCC). “Mixed had been doing pretty poorly over the last several years in the -$2 per ton range nationwide,” she says.

But when the pandemic hit, recovered paper prices spiked in the spring of 2020. Germain says recovered paper prices have decreased from that spike, but not substantially, as of December 2020. She adds that the increase in recovered paper values has helped to somewhat prop up overall blended MRF values in the U.S. this past year compared with 2019.

“The spike in general for paper grades in the early stages of COVID, it was really a double-edged sword,” a national independent recycler who wishes to remain anonymous tells Recycling Today. “We saw [recovered paper] prices scream through the roof; but, at the same time, it’s because there was not much supply.”

On the container side, some prices have gone up, while others went down in 2020 compared with 2019.

“We’ve always relied on aluminum to be a kind of mainstay [at MRFs], but aluminum prices have been flat to dropping over the last year,” Germain says.

A 2020 study conducted by Gershman, Brickner & Bratton Inc., based in McLean, Virginia, for the Can Manufacturers Institute underlines the value that aluminum used beverage cans (UBCs) bring to MRFs. The report found that without the revenue from UBCs, most MRFs would not be able to operate without making significant changes that would ultimately affect the cost of recycling to consumers.

Germain says high-density polyethylene (HDPE) prices rose in 2020 compared with 2019. Pricing for natural HDPE and colored HDPE bottle bales has been trending upward in recent months, sources in that sector of the industry told Recycling Today in November 2020.

The national independent recycler adds that he has noticed that most commodities sold by MRFs, including plastics and metal scrap, seemed to have increased in value in 2020 relative to 2019.

“Everything generally is better than 2019,” he says. “2019 might be one of the worst years in decades for MRF materials. Even if you take out that two-month spike in OCC prices and look at the rest of 2020 in comparison with 2019, it’s still better. HDPE right now is very positive in pricing. We’re seeing a lot of the metals grades not skyrocketing, but they’re good. We’re able to move things, and pricing is generally better.”

This article originally appeared in the January issue of Recycling Today, a sister publication of Waste Today. The author is managing editor of Recycling Today and can be reached at msmalley@gie.net.

Since being formed in 1989 in the interest of reducing reliance on landfills in the region, the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio (SWACO) has become an influential mouthpiece for food waste diversion efforts in Ohio’s Franklin County.

With over a million pounds of food waste entering the county landfill every day, the organization recognized an immediate need to coordinate reduction efforts in combination with composting and recycling services to help reduce the amount of organic materials ending up in the waste stream.

“We realized this topic of food waste was a big opportunity, but didn’t have a whole lot of coordination,” says Kyle O’Keefe, director of innovation and programs for SWACO. “So, we created this model of bringing dozens, if not hundreds, of community partner organizations into the conversation and kind of designed it from the ground up.”

SWACO launched the Central Ohio Food Waste Initiative (COFWI) in September 2018, which the authority says is a collective impact approach to solving local food waste challenges. Bringing together business leaders and key stakeholders, the initiative includes participation from over 40 central Ohio-based organizations, representing all facets of the food chain.

“[COFWI] really came from the premise that no one organization can really impact food waste on their own, but need to work collectively and take shared ownership and responsibility of this issue,” says O’Keefe. “So, we’ve been working with health departments, trade associations, universities, private businesses, food manufacturers and more to align our goals and strategies.”

After nearly a year of planning and community engagement on behalf of COFWI, SWACO released its first multifaceted action plan to address food waste in May 2019. The Food Waste Action Plan focuses on three areas: preventing food waste, rescuing edible food and redistributing it, and recycling food waste by turning it into energy or useful products such as compost.

With these goals in mind, COFWI has begun to implement the 20 solutions presented in the plan, beginning with developing an education campaign to raise food waste awareness.

COMMUNITY OUTREACH

In September of last year, SWACO introduced “Save More Than Food, Make a Difference,” a consumer education campaign aimed at reducing commercial and residential food waste by 50 percent by 2030. The campaign is designed to communicate an important message—that when food goes to waste, so does all of the time, money and resources that went into producing it.

According to SWACO, wasted food accounts for an estimated $106 million in economic loss in central Ohio annually. In addition, 22 million gallons of gas and 41 billion gallons of water are used every year to grow and transport food that never gets eaten.

“Here in central Ohio, the average family of four is purchasing $1,500 in food every year that they’re not actually eating,” says Hanna Greer-Brown, communications manager for SWACO. “So, when they save that food by preventing waste in the first place or using it, they’re saving money. We’ve developed messaging to connect with that stakeholder group, but then also consumers and restaurants, students and cafeterias.”

The campaign’s website provides tips and advice for residents and different industry partners, as well as resources including worksheets, brochures, posters and flyers on diversion best practices. Through the program, commercial kitchens can participate in donating uneaten meals and training employees on food waste prevention practices. Individuals are encouraged to reduce waste by shopping smarter, eating leftovers and participating in local composting programs, says SWACO.

“We of course have messaging and resources to help residents at home cut food waste in the kitchen or when they’re eating out, but we also have resources for our [commercial] partners to begin to tackle food waste in their own regions or in their cafeterias, and prevent it, rescue it and recycle it,” Greer-Brown says. “We tried to create a wide variety of resources that we thought different partners would be able to use and implement.”

Most recently, the U.S. EPA awarded a $60,000 grant to SWACO, which will be used to measure the baseline of food waste behaviors and outcomes in a central Ohio community, and subsequently, explore how the Save More Than Food campaign changes behaviors to reduce food waste.

"[COFWI] really came from the premise that no one organization can really impact food waste on their own, but need to work collectively and take shared ownership and responsibility of this issue,” –Kyle O’Keefe, director of innovation and programs, SWACO

This grant is the second example of national recognition SWACO has received for its work surrounding food waste diversion. In October 2020, the National Recycling Coalition named SWACO as its “Outstanding Recycling Organization for 2020” for outstanding growth of programs and impacts pertaining to food waste diversion.

“We believe the Save More Than Food campaign will help people understand the severity of the food waste problem in central Ohio and encourage them to reduce food waste in their own homes,” said Ty Marsh, SWACO’s executive director, in a release. “But the grant from the U.S. EPA will let us know for certain what type of impact the campaign has had.”

TRACKING BEHAVIOR

SWACO will be partnering with The Ohio State University (OSU) and the city of Upper Arlington on this grant project. The groups will be working together to evaluate which outreach messages resonate most strongly with participants.

“We’re really looking to understand what moves people to change behaviors,” says Greer-Brown. “Is it the economic message that when you save food partaking in these certain activities, you save money, or is it the environmental message?”

OSU’s research team will develop and conduct resident surveys between Feb. 1 and May 31 to find out if the campaign has had an impact on residents’ views and behaviors regarding food waste. The team will also conduct a waste audit, where they’ll examine random samples of residential waste and separate it into categories to determine how much of it is food.

“We’re going to sample the waste stream from various routes that are receiving different treatments, so we’ll have kind of a pre-sample indicating what the current level of food waste is. We’ll even be doing some granular waste sampling, not just of an entire truckload of material, but also at a household level as well so we can drill down into some of these surveys and understand how [these efforts] are impacting their particular waste generation,” says O’Keefe.

OSU plans to compile and share the results of the surveys and waste audit by November, creating a peer-reviewed manuscript for academic use and likely hosting webinars aimed at the consumer audience.

LOOKING AHEAD

The city of Upper Arlington offers residents a composting program for food scraps and is part of ongoing efforts to reduce the waste that unnecessarily ends up at the landfill in the region. The drop-off composting program, which has received assistance from SWACO, and has grown to three drop-off locations and a total of 17 collection containers in the area. To date, the drop-off program alone has yielded over 70,000 pounds of food waste.

As part of the SWACO- and EPA-funded project, SWACO will work with Upper Arlington city officials and staff to communicate with residents about the surveys, conduct a waste audit and use Save More Than Food campaign materials to measure the impacts of the educational resources such as emails, newsletters, webinars and community events.

“Upper Arlington is proud of our ongoing food waste composting program that has, to date, collected over 150,000 pounds of waste that would otherwise end up at the landfill,” said Jackie Thiel, public service director for the city of Upper Arlington, in a release. “This partnership and grant with SWACO and the Ohio State University will continue our efforts and bring additional awareness to the severity of the food waste problem in central Ohio.”

Since the campaign’s initial launch, Greer-Brown says SWACO is seeing a lot of excitement and involvement from the community in terms of sharing social media posts, printing posters and distributing information about the campaign.

“We’ve had a great response from our partners,” she says. “We are seeing a significant uptick in traffic to our websites, so we know our residents and others are going to our website for information on this. We also have some [positive] paid advertising analytics regarding the number of people who are taking our quick [survey] or clicking a link.”

O’Keefe adds, “We have seen just a general community efficacy around this topic a lot more in the past couple of years, and I think that’s because of the dialogue that’s occurring there. We’re seeing more of that interest and support to back it as well, so that’s been really exciting to see that conversation start throughout our community.”

The author is the assistant editor of Waste Today and can be reached at hrischar@gie.net.

Between dealing with a pandemic and slowed economy, more employees working from home, a new presidential administration and a change of power in the Senate, the waste and recycling industry has been forced to adapt to constant change within the last year.

To understand the state of the industry as we move through the first quarter of 2021, Waste Today reached out to Darrell Smith, president and CEO at the National Waste and Recycling Association (NWRA); David Biderman, executive director and CEO at the Solid Waste Association of North America (SWANA); Michael E. Hoffman, managing director and group head diversified industrials at Stifel; Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) Chief Economist and Director of Commodities Joe Pickard and ISRI Chief Lobbyist Billy Johnson.

Waste Today (WT): Can you discuss the impact that COVID and the larger economy might have on the waste and recycling industry in 2021?

Smith: The waste and recycling industry responded quickly to challenges brought on by the global COVID-19 pandemic. NWRA worked with federal, state and local governments to ensure that waste and recycling collection could continue. In the early days of the pandemic, as many Americans began to work from home, residential collection rose, and commercial collection declined.

While the waste and recycling industry faced challenges in 2020 and continues to face them even now, our service-based sector is more resilient than many other sectors in the broader economy. The industry reacted quickly to changes early during the pandemic addressing requests for pauses in service as the industry worked with their customers.

One bright spot over the past year has been the recovery of recycling commodity pricing. Fiber prices have experienced steadily increasing prices and natural HDPE hit record high prices. And, while many struggled over the past year, the ongoing worldwide shortage of shipping containers suggests that the waste and recycling industry will need to handle additional materials in the future.

Biderman: COVID will continue to have a substantial impact on the waste and recycling industry in 2021, particularly during the first half of the year. Many Americans continue to work from home, and many schools and offices remain closed. This means continued elevated levels of residential waste, and decreased commercial waste. Unlike spring 2020, when SWANA estimates that residential waste and recyclables were 20 percent above normal, we believe current levels are about 5 to 10 percent above normal. As more Americans get vaccinated, schools and offices will reopen, people will feel more comfortable traveling again, and waste levels in both the residential and commercial sides of the industry will normalize even further.

Some solid waste companies have been hurt by the decline in commercial volume. There may be acquisition opportunities for well-financed companies to acquire some of these smaller haulers.

Hoffman: When discussing the pandemic and its impact on the overall economy, it really comes down to what political choices were made regionally on a state/local level—what was shut down; for how long; and once open, were these businesses allowed to stay open even with varying degrees of restrictions coming on or off? If an economy is open, then commercial solid waste services are necessary.

The initial impact looks like a wave of lost business in the commercial and permanent roll-off markets. Suspending service looks like a “cancel” purely from an accounting standpoint. The immediate response of the service providers was to rein in costs … and rationalize assets—and do it quickly. The evidence shows that it did happen quickly, with little or no disruption of service overall. As customers reopened, that looked like new business growth on a leaner cost structure.

Exiting 2020, down volumes will reflect what is not open or only partially open, and most service interval changes happened at the point of reopening. Operators have retained some of the time/cost savings with weight-based volumes coming back as business recovered. Pricing leverage remains in open markets with core prices expected to be in the 4 to 6 percent range and reported price between 2 and 4 percent.

Residential trends were different as work-from-home mandates resulted in behavior changes early on with panic buying resulting in perishables being discarded and more home projects being done, leading to a lot of extra volume at the curb. That immediate bump settled into a sustained increase in cart weights of 5 to 7 percent on average, much of which cannot be recovered immediately based on contract language.

Pickard: In the second quarter of last year, we saw a significant contraction in the U.S. economy. The health of the U.S. economy, manufacturing and the scrap industry are all closely connected.

Already this year, we see a resurgence in commodity pricing, especially for metals markets. Commodity prices have been trending higher on the back of positive manufacturing reports from China and the major developed economies, which generally bodes well for scrap demand. Additionally, the markets responded positively to the U.S. elections results. Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) reports are signaling continued growth ahead, albeit at slower rates than previously reported.

For recyclers, capital investments and other efficiency gains have lowered certain risks due to COVID, but supply constraints, labor shortages, transport/logistical hurdles, regulatory costs, and trade restrictions are all still uncertain.

Looking at potential opportunities, rising societal concerns about sustainable development, environmental protection and climate change increasingly reinforce recycling’s critical role in conserving natural resources, reducing energy costs and greenhouse gas emissions, and preserving low-cost raw material inputs for our manufacturing industries.

WT: Can you discuss the impact that the Biden administration (and democrat-controlled Senate) will have on the waste and recycling industry in 2021 and beyond?

Smith: We anticipate there will be a number of bills that address recycling, PFAS, infrastructure and plastics introduced in Congress. Democrats have a small majority in the House, and the Senate is split 50-50 with Vice President Kamala Harris having the tie-breaking vote as president of the Senate. The makeup of the Senate means that Democrats may need greater support from Republicans to move bills.

The new administration has taken a number of immediate steps with respect to reviewing various regulations that [were enacted or enforced] during the last administration and recommitted to the Paris Climate Agreement. The industry is eager to work with the new administration as they work to enact their policy goals.

Biderman: The Biden administration faces multiple crises. We have the pandemic, the economic downturn, the aftermath of the attack on the Capitol—including a likely trial of former President Trump in the Senate—and continued racial and social strife in the United States. These will be the top priorities for both President Biden and Congress. Addressing immigration reform and improving Obamacare are also top priorities. These issues will almost certainly consume most of the legislative and regulatory bandwidth in 2021, and possibly beyond.

Climate change and environmental justice are the two key environmental issues that the Biden administration will focus on, at least initially. The legislative and regulatory actions taken will likely impact the solid waste and recycling industry, and SWANA will be working with congressional leaders, EPA and others to make sure the industry’s voice is heard. Federal regulations usually take years to be issued, so I would be surprised if major action is taken in 2021.

Hoffman: With the Senate split 50:50 and the House 222-213, the centrist Democrats in both chambers will limit the scope of tax changes, court-packing and other aggressive progressive policy initiatives. The Biden administration will be very focused on climate issues, but may be limited to executive orders to accomplish its agenda. Solid waste will not see any meaningful regulatory changes. PFAS is likely to get a federal maximum contaminant level (MCL), and solid waste is part of the solution managing PFAS as it cycles through the economy.

Johnson: Over the past several years, recycling has gained more and more of the public’s attention partly as a result of the public’s awareness of marine plastics and China’s discontinuation of imports of municipal recyclables.

In the 115th and 116th Congresses, there were numerous recycling bills introduced, primarily focusing on residential recycling. However, most of the proposed legislation does not address helping create and sustain markets for these materials. Without markets, we don’t have recycling.

We anticipate the Biden administration and the 117th Congress will continue addressing recycling, especially residential recycling. Moreover, recycling has become more and more bipartisan as lawmakers have found common ground towards addressing some of the challenges faced by recyclers.

ISRI believes the RECYCLE Act directly addresses the problem of residential recycling quality by educating citizens on what to recycle and what not to include in their recycling. The legislation enjoys bipartisan support in both Houses.

ISRI feels that recycling legislation should focus on two related areas: quality and markets. Without markets, recycling does not occur. And quality makes markets by delivering an alternative to virgin materials, and as a result, helps address climate issues and the environment.

The Biden administration and Congress have clearly indicated that climate will be a top priority. Recycling is one of the best ways to address climate by conserving energy and natural resources.

The Biden administration and Congress have also indicated that climate will be an integral element in infrastructure. Recyclable content should be a priority in these infrastructure projects as that will help satisfy these environmental, sustainability and climate goals. Using recycled content also helps create markets and drive demand for these materials.

We look forward to working with the Biden administration and the 117th Congress to help advance recycling.

WT: Any other trends or focal points of attention you’re looking at for the waste industry in 2021?

Smith: We will continue to be engaged on issues surrounding COVID-19. We are also committed to safety. According to the BLS, we are the sixth-most dangerous occupation. That’s down from fifth. Earlier this year, we made NWRA’s Safety Monday guidance, [which contains safety-related educational resources], free to those who register for it, and we will continue to work to make our industry safer.

Biderman: SWANA will continue to work with the EPA on finalizing its National Recycling Strategy. I expect the Biden administration EPA may be interested in a more aggressive approach to recycling, and we will be having conversations with the new appointees in the coming weeks. I also expect activity on PFAS, including a proposed MCL under the Safe Drinking Water Act, and the possible designation of PFAS as a hazardous substance under the Superfund program.

A trend that will continue in 2021 will be a high level of mergers and acquisitions in the industry: All of the larger companies have strong acquisition pipelines, and some owners of hauling companies may be looking to exit the business.

Hoffman: M&A is likely to return to its normal course in 2021, generally. [This is more] company-specific regarding deals [that may have been] long under discussion. Price and volume should be positive, with volume starting out negative but quickly swinging positive as the year over year comparisons ease. Capital spending should be relatively normal with the mix slightly more toward rolling stock than disposal. If household formation remains strong, then new business formation could provide an added volume kicker late in 2021.

The author is the editor of Waste Today and can be reached at aredling@gie.net.