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Co-mingled Recycling, March 20, 2008

Join Jay Simmons, Process Engineer, North Pacific Paper Corp in Longview, WA; Richard Gertman, Principal and Owner of Environmental Planning Consultants, San Jose, CA; and Viccy Salazar, lead for the Waste Reduction, Resource Conservation and Stewardship team, US EPA Region 10 to hear about how the trend toward co-mingled recycling has affected end markets. Learn what you can do to make sure the materials collected through co-mingled systems are actually recycled into new products.

At this session you will learn:

  1. How the changes to co-mingled collection systems have affected the quality of recycled materials
  2. Best practices for your co-mingled system
  3. Best practices for getting the highest environmental value out of your recycled materials
  4. How one group of stakeholders is jointly addressing the issue and coming up with agreement to make the whole system more efficient

Speakers

Jay Simmons
Process Engineer, North Pacific Paper Corp
Longview, WA

Jay Simmons is a Process Engineer with North Pacific Paper Corp in Longview, WA. He has over 30 years with NORPAC and Weyerhaeuser. He started in Weyerhaeuser R&D focusing on recycling technology and has worked on numerous projects related to new process concepts and product development over the past 20 years. Mr. Simmons was a key participant in setting up program that sourced quality raw material for the startup of the news deinking facility at NORPAC. His current responsibilities include: Process Engineer for the Deinking process and Management of raw materials.

Presentation (PDF) (21 pp, 835K, About PDF)

Richard Gertman
Principal and Owner, Environmental Planning Consultants
San Jose, CA

Richard Gertman is the principal and owner of Environmental Planning Consultants, a small private consulting firm based in San Jose, California. He has recently co-authored a Best Practices Manual and companion Best Practices Guide to Single Stream Recycling with Susan Kinsella of Conservatree, and works to assist communities improve their waste management practices. He currently serves on the Board of Californians Against Waste, and has served on the Boards of the National Recycling Coalition, the California Resource Recovery Association, and the Northern California Recycling Association. Mr. Gertman was named "Recycler of the Year" by the California Resource Recovery Association in 1984.

Presentation (PDF) (35 pp, 155K, About PDF)

Viccy Salazar
Waste Reduction, Resource Conservation and Stewardship
US EPA, Region 10

Viccy Salazar has worked at the US EPA, Region 10 since 1995. She is currently the lead for the Waste Reduction, Resource Conservation and Stewardship team which includes recycling, climate change, solid waste, priority chemicals reduction and product stewardship. In her tenure at EPA, she has worked on traditional regulatory programs – lead and PCBs - and stewardship programs - product stewardship, recycling and electronics stewardship. Ms. Salazar was the lead on the development of several large stakeholder projects including EPEAT, the Federal Electronics Challenge and several large scale electronics take-back programs She is currently the lead on a project to identify effective processes and measurement tools to improve the quality and quantity of materials actually recovered through the co-mingled recycling system. Ms. Salazar has both a Master of Business Administration and a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from the University of Washington.

Presentation (PDF) (28 pp, 1.0MB, About PDF)

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