Originally published Feb 13/19 The Reminder. Flin Flon, Mb. Sponsored by North of 53 Consumers Coop.
This past year brought several changes at the Recycling Centre.
We set a new record with 510 metric tons (tonnes) recycled. Corrugated cardboard increased by 50 tonnes. Commingled materials dropped by six and a half tonnes after significant increases in the three previous years. This is concerning as it may indicate fewer people are recycling at home.
The after Christmas mountain of materials at the beginning of 2018 almost crushed us. We got behind before Christmas because we closed for three days while our new baler was put in place. There wasn’t time to get it operational so we couldn’t use it to bale up the Christmas backlog.
Illness and the death of one of our crew left us in shock and short staffed for most of January. Our forklift also had a break down which complicated things.
We were able to catch up by February. The new baler was operational on February 8. It has been an essential addition to our operations as we could not keep up without it.
We purchased a trailer to collect cardboard and electronics at the landfill. This makes it more convenient for contractors to recycle.
We began to separate, bale and sell aluminum cans in March as the price paid for corrugated cardboard had dropped dramatically at the end of 2017.
The cost of sorting materials increased dramatically in August so we changed to a processor where the increase was not as much.
We shipped 26 semi-trailer loads of cardboard, commingled materials, office paper and aluminum cans last year.
Thirty tonnes (three trailers) of electronics and 654 kg of batteries were recycled in 2018.
2018 was a challenging but very successful year.
This past year brought several changes at the Recycling Centre.
We set a new record with 510 metric tons (tonnes) recycled. Corrugated cardboard increased by 50 tonnes. Commingled materials dropped by six and a half tonnes after significant increases in the three previous years. This is concerning as it may indicate fewer people are recycling at home.
The after Christmas mountain of materials at the beginning of 2018 almost crushed us. We got behind before Christmas because we closed for three days while our new baler was put in place. There wasn’t time to get it operational so we couldn’t use it to bale up the Christmas backlog.
Illness and the death of one of our crew left us in shock and short staffed for most of January. Our forklift also had a break down which complicated things.
We were able to catch up by February. The new baler was operational on February 8. It has been an essential addition to our operations as we could not keep up without it.
We purchased a trailer to collect cardboard and electronics at the landfill. This makes it more convenient for contractors to recycle.
We began to separate, bale and sell aluminum cans in March as the price paid for corrugated cardboard had dropped dramatically at the end of 2017.
The cost of sorting materials increased dramatically in August so we changed to a processor where the increase was not as much.
We shipped 26 semi-trailer loads of cardboard, commingled materials, office paper and aluminum cans last year.
Thirty tonnes (three trailers) of electronics and 654 kg of batteries were recycled in 2018.
2018 was a challenging but very successful year.
RSS Feed