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Phoenix is steadily building its recycling infrastructure through separation of materials from the residential and commercial sectors.
IN the fall of 1995, Phoenix, Arizona, accelerated implementation of its residential curbside recycling program adding an average of 1,700 homes per week, doubling the previous rate driving plans for new processing capacity. The city now predicts all 85,000 households will be served by the end of 1997. The totally commingled, automated recycling program is designed for high diversion. Residents are given two 100 gallon rollout carts, one for a wide range of recyclables (paper, glass, plastic, steel and aluminum are mixed together), and the other for refuse. Both refuse and recyclables are picked up weekly.
Recyclables are sorted at a materials recovery facility (MRF) operated by CRInc. The facility has special equipment to separate containers from paper fibers - with these streams further sorted into marketable materials. But the design capacity of the MRF (90,000 tons/year) is not adequate to handle the expected 125,000 tons collected when Phoenix completes implementation of curbside recycling.
According to recycling coordinator Karen Schuldt, Phoenix is interested in receiving more long-term revenue from its recycling program. Unlike most municipalities across the United States, Phoenix's revenues for newspaper held fairly steady during recent months at $65/ton. Based on long-term offers from mills, Schuldt believes the city can count on average revenue of $75/ton for curbside material during the next decade.
The city, which currently operates a MRF for commercial recyclables, is planning to expand that facility to process about 90,000 tons/year of curbside materials. (When the MRF is expanded, the city expects to send less materials to CRInc.) There is excess capacity in the city's 100,000 square foot roofed transfer station enough to use 60,000 square feet for sorting, says Bruce Henning, solid waste disposal administrator. The retrofit will give officials more control over processing, he adds.
The expanded MRF will be designed along similar lines to CRInc.'s facility. Bidders will have flexibility in designing some parts of the MRF, but in other cases - particularly in the separation of paper from containers - Bezner equipment (which is used and marketed by CRInc.) will be incorporated. CRInc. has come a long way since its MRF opened in 1992. At the time, the...