Waste & Recycling News Digital Edition

Crain’s News Source for Environmental Management

Retroworks starts TV takeback

By Joe Truini

A Vermont electronics recycler is hoping refurbished U.S. televisions are a big hit south of the border as America converts to digital TV.

American Retroworks Inc. has started a program to take back old televisions at its Retroworks de Mexico unit, which is run by a Mexican women’s cooperative. Residents can exchange their old TVs for a $10 coupon toward buying a working unit recovered from the United States.

Selling working televisions collected in the United States makes recycling nonworking units collected in Mexico less expensive, said Robin Ingenthron, president of American Retroworks. A used 1999 analog television can be sold in Latin America for $40, enough to pay for recycling two scrap televisions, he said.

Several Latin American countries, including Mexico, Peru, Venezuela and the Dominican Republic use the same analog television signal the United States is phasing out to convert to digital, Ingenthron said.

The program will help, not solve, the dilemma of exporting working electronics to developing countries, he said. When those units ultimately fail, they also must be recycled, which means sending working units can

merely displace the problem.

Leaving poorer nations disconnected is not the solution, Ingenthron said. The Retroworks de Mexico trade-in program will take in at least one junk television for each refurbished one it sells, which helps create jobs, promote reuse and protect the environment in places that

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TV TAKEBACK: A Vermont electronics recycler is hoping refurbished U.S. televisions are a big hit south of the border. American Retroworks Inc. has started a program to take back old TVs at its Retroworks de Mexico unit, which is run by a Mexican women’s cooperative. Residents can exchange their old TVs for a $10 coupon toward buying a working unit recovered from the United States.

Recyclers’ HDPE pie is shrinking

By Mike Verespej

A significant increase in the amount of high density polyethylene bottles collected in the U.S. but exported to other countries is putting pressure on U.S. reclaimers to find sources of sup-

ply elsewhere.

Compounding that problem, the HDPE bottle recycling rate dropped to 26% in 2007, from 27.1% in 2005 and 26.4% in 2006.

“We’re constantly purchasing a substantial volume of material

from Central and South America and from Canada,” said KW Plastics General Manager Scott Saunders. The Troy, Ala., firm is the largest HDPE recycler in the U.S. “We also have to fight with other reclaimers over a smaller pie,” Saunders said in a March 2

phone interview.

More than 23% of the HDPE bottles collected in the U.S. in 2007 were exported, taking 214 million pounds of supply out of domestic recyclers’ hands — 50%

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WRN Scrap Report now online

Waste & Recycling News has launched an electronic newsletter targeted at the scrap and recycling market.

Scrap Report Online is an e-mail publication with the latest news and information on scrap and recycling. It is sent to subscribers every two weeks. The first issue debuted March 9.

The format is similar to Waste & Recycling News’ Daily E-mail. Scrap Report Online delivers the latest scrap and recycling news like the WRN print version supplement, Scrap Report. It also includes the latest commodity pricing information.

“We’re excited to provide the scrap and recycling audience the best news and infor-

mation they can get in a convenient and immediate electronic format,” said Publisher Robert Simmons.

“This gives readers another way to get the news they need, just as Scrap Report does in print,” added Editor Allan Gerlat.

To subscribe to Scrap Report Online, go to www.wasterecyclingnews.com/news-mail/ screcsignup.html. For any questions, contact Associate Editor Megan Greenwalt at 330-865-6173 or by e-mail at mgreen- walt@crain.com. ■

Infrastructure
tops agenda

By Mike Verespej

The autumn 2008 market crash that left a lot of recycled plastics sitting in warehouses, waiting for better prices, has eased in the past month with a slight uptick in value.

But the anxiety about recycled-resin prices among reclaimers at the Plastics Recycling Conference, held Feb. 24-25 in Orlando, Fla., was matched — if not surpassed — by the anxiety of plastic product manufacturers, industry associations and coalitions