By Pepper Fisher
PORT ANGELES – As the City of Port Angeles transitions into taking over the collection of recycling from Waste Connections, we learned this week they will no longer be able to recycle glass. Customers have been told to put glass in with their regular garbage until further notice.
The announcement said City officials have discovered there is only one recycling facility in Washington state, and they are no longer accepting glass at this time. That company is Strategic Materials in Seattle. They separate the glass by color and break it into small pieces, called cullet, then send it to Seattle-based Ardagh Glass to make new bottles. But the supply of glass greatly outweighs the industry’s ability to process it.
Until a few years ago, more than 60% of Washington’s recycled material was exported to China or other Asian markets. Although glass was not sent to China, other materials contaminated by broken or leaking glass containers were. In 2018, the Chinese government implemented new regulations, and basically told the US that our recycled materials were too contaminated to accept. West coast states are particularly impacted due to the reliance on Chinese markets.
The new import bans created a major disruption in Washington and throughout the region because material recovery facilities in Washington have been drastically slowing down their processing of recyclable materials in an attempt to reduce contamination in the bales they export. Add to that the fact that because of new technologies, it’s often more expensive to transport, clean, and process recycled glass than it is to make new glass.
Here’s Public Works Director Thomas Hunter.
“We know that the glass recycling market is extremely complex and different than it was five years ago. The west coast just didn’t have the facilities to take on the sheer volume that really happened overnight when those export opportunities were removed. And so, that’s where we really have to dive in and try and find opportunities to put that stream to beneficial use, and that’s the process that we’re going through right now”
A Washington State Dept. of Commerce report from 2020 says in the U.S. it is estimated that 66% of glass is not recycled.
In 10 states, glass bottles are collected through a mandatory deposit program, also known as a bottle bill. Residents pay a deposit on glass bottles and then return them to a collection center for redemption. The packaging producers are made responsible for funding the costs of these operations. Oregon was the first state in the US to have a bottle bill in 1971, and California enacted a bottle bill in 1987.
But despite several attempts over the past 50 years, Washington has been unable to pass a bottle bill of our own.
Hunter says the City will continue to explore its options, but they won’t make a decision until they know it’s a good one.
“It’s our job. It’s our mission to find a sustainable approach for the community, for the, for the stream itself. And we don’t want to end up in a relationship where we turn these materials over and something happens to it in a vacuum somewhere and we don’t know what that is. We want to get away from that. That’s one of the reasons that we didn’t want to continue with the contract with our previous hauler. So we are excited about that new level of transparency that we can bring.”
We also learned from the City this week that beginning March 1st, the Blue Mountain Transfer Station will be temporarily closed for about 6 weeks. Hunter says they offered to buy or lease the existing heavy equipment at the facility from Waste Connections…
“…and they just weren’t interested in that conversation. And unfortunately, due to supply chain issues and how long it’s taking everything to be manufactured, we’re anticipating that kind of six week time frame that it’s going to take to get that equipment in, get it installed, startup, have staff ready to go to operate that facility. And I think that it’ll operate quite smoothly once we get through that little period.”
Hunter says they’ll also use the time to work on some short-term improvements to the facility, including security and ingress/egress issues.