Dive Brief:
- Republic Services has completed its commercial and residential mixed-waste sorting system at Anaheim Recycling Center in California, which can process 1,000 tons of material a day at 100 tons per hour, as reported in Waste360.
- Designed by RRT Design & Construction and Bulk Handling Systems (BHS), the upgraded commercial technology features two 70-foot trommels to boost capacity and recovery rates. The mixed-waste system, which has five Debris Roll Screens, is integrated with an existing 50-tph single-stream system.
- Among the facility's benefits to the community are more than 80 quality control jobs, and a learning center where visitors are invited to watch recycling operations from an observation deck. Republic has had a presence in Orange County for 50 years, currently serving 200,000 residential and 12,300 commercial customers, and has grown its workforce there to 600 employees.
Dive Insight:
The new upgrade is in line with Orange County’s decades-long priorities; leveraging cutting-edge technology to stay on top of sustainability practices while satisfying market demand. So far the new site has surpassed projected expectations, and with all its bells and whistles it is expected to double marketplace capacity.
"This community was an early adopter of All-In-One Recycling, at home and work, which made recycling easier and enabled greater participation. Now, with the expanded commercial capabilities, we're positioned to bring durability to local recycling initiatives, and help our customers achieve their long-term sustainability goals," said Heath Eddleblute, area president of Republic Services, as reported in Waste360.
The system was engineered with future needs in mind, namely anticipating commercial recycling growth. Even the original design incorporated future considerations.
"When we designed the single-stream system, we built in capacity and design features to process recyclables from the mixed-waste system, particularly with our NRT optical line," BHS CEO Steve Miller said in a statement.
Orange County is also forging ahead on the WTE energy front. With its latest $60 million plant at Bowerman Landfill, every one of the municipality’s major disposal sites has a gas-to-electricity plant.
