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RESOURCE RECOVERY
IN SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT
This report (SW-67r) was written by
LOUIS W. LEFKE
Environment! ""'_•• "yj-lion Agency
Li: ri.iv . : '
1 Worth \L ...-..::• j i-ive
Chicago, Illinois 60606
U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY
1971
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Mr. Lefke presented this paper on February 83
1971, at a symposium on Technology for the
Future to Control Industrial and Urban Wastes
held at the University of Missouri at Rolla;
it appears on pages 24 and 25 of the symposium
proceedings.
OTECTION AGENCY
Single copies of this publication are available
from solid waste management publications distri-
bution unit, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency,
Cincinnati, Ohio 45268.
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RESOURCE RECOVERY
IN SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT
by Louis W. Lefke*
Solid wastes have been with us and will
continue to be for as long as we have an indus-
trial and commercial society that uses and
discards materials. There have been numerous
reports by the Solid Waste Management Office
and by others on the present and growing magni-
tude of our Nation's solid wastes. Current
estimates indicate that about 250 million tons
of household, commercial, and municipal refuse
are annually generated in our Nation. This is
a rather large amount of data that statisticians
play with to determine how many and how large
should railroad cars be to contain this much
material, or how high a pile can it make. This
is one way of dramatizing the Nation's produc-
tion of solid waste, but I believe that the
number alone--250 million tons--is significant
enough for you, indeed anyone, to realize that
there presently is a very large amount of solid
waste. Unfortunately, the present solid waste
*Director, Solid Waste Research Division,
National Environmental Research Center, Office
of Research and Monitoring, U.S. Environmental
Protection Agency.
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situation is in a growth stage,, We estimate
that in about 15 years the Nation will have to
collect, process, and dispose of about twice
the present amount of solid waste produced.
The key to overcoming this national problem
is how the Nation "processes" its growing re-
source, solid waste. The most frequently used
practices, which were developed more years ago
than I care to remember, are burn or bury.
These are still the major methods used today,
but, of course, with some improved approaches„
The major urban areas are the primary
centers of the "solid waste problem." Most of
our city officials are presently caught with
rising costs for all municipal services, are
threatened by a citizenry that does not wish to
have another foul smelling incinerator in its
midst, and are running out of land in which to
deposit the collected solid wastes or incinera-
tor residue.
I have no doubt that incineration will
continue to be used for processing solid wastes
now and in the foreseeable future. From the
viewpoint of the fellow who is daily inundated
with our waste products, the primary benefit of
incineration is volume reduction. But, the
citizen driving by a stinking, smoking stack
has a different viewpoint. He can afford this
viewpoint; he does not have the responsibility.
Solid waste incineration can serve well,
especially when adequate air pollution control
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equipment is used and valuable resources (heat
and residue) are recovered.
Sanitary landfilling is also needed for
solid waste disposal. This is the only approach
that we have for "disposal," An adequately
designed, located, and operated sanitary land-
fill can be an asset to a community. I caution
and remind you that a sanitary landfill is not
an open dump, a modified landfill, or any other
similarly described operation.
Concerned citizens all too frequently take
the approach "Why don't they do something about
this or that." Government at all levels and
private industries are attempting to put forth
workable solutions for proper solid waste
management, but the citizenry fails to realize
that "they" is "them," and that when it comes
time to pay the bill, it is "them" and not "they"
who does the paying. Too frequently, this is
the time when the job does not get done properly.
FEDERAL LEGISLATION LEADS THE WAY
The Solid Waste Disposal Act (Public Law
89-272), which became a reality in October 1965,
must be acknowledged as a significant milestone
toward proper solid waste management. The in-
tent of the legislation was to assist State and
local governments and private interests at the
operating level to do a better job of solid
waste management. The Act provided a well-
rounded program that included:
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(1) State-wide and interstate survey and
planning grants to assist in determining the
magnitude of urban, rural, industrial, commer-
cial, and agricultural solid waste management
problems, and to lay the groundwork for feasible
and orderly solid waste management plans;
(2) Demonstration grants to show at full-
scale operating level that new and improved
methods of solid waste management can be feas-
ible, economical, and practical and do a better
job;
(3) Research grants and contracts to de-
termine the characteristics of varied solid
wastes, to find new ways of source reduction,
to develop new and improved systems of storage,
collection and transport, volume reduction,
processing, resource recovery, and ultimate
disposal;
(4) Training at the graduate and tech-
nician level to provide technical and managerial
knowhow so that the recommendations and results
from research and demonstration efforts can be
used.
The intent of this Act has been met and
met well.
The Congress and the present administration
have recognized that efforts need to be continued.
The Solid Waste Disposal Act was amended in
October 1970 when President Nixon signed the
Resource Recovery Act of 1970. I wish to em-
phasize the title—"The Resource Recovery Act
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of 1970." This Act continues the efforts
started under the 1965 Act, but the title alone
indicates a change of congressional and national
thinking in solid waste management. The growing
resource called solid waste needs to be re-
covered to avoid wasteful depletion of national
and worldwide resources. The United States has
a consuming economy; with approximately 7% of
the world's population, we consume almost half
of the world's resources. The new Federal
legislation takes direct aim at promoting re-
source recycling.
THERE IS NOTHING NEW ABOUT RESOURCE RECOVERY
Resource recovery, recycling, and salvage
are all terms that mean essentially the same.
To me, they mean use of nonvirgin materials.
President Nixon in his 1970 message to Congress
on the environment said: "As we look toward
the long range future in 1980 - 2000 and be-
yond, recycling of materials will become
increasingly necessary not only for waste dis-
posal but also to conserve resources. While
our population grows, each one of us keeps
using more and more of our earth's resources.
In the case of many common minerals, more than
half of those extracted from the earth since
time began had been extracted since 1910. A
great deal of our space research has been
directed towards creating self sustaining en-
vironments in which people can live for long
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periods of time by reprocessing, recycling, and
reusing the same materials."
The President also said: "We need to ap-
ply this kind of thinking more conscientiously
and more broadly to our pattern of use and dis-
posal of materials here on earth."
This "tone of thinking" is paramount in the
Resource Recovery Act. As this Act gives new
emphasis to solid waste management, it may hold
somewhat revolutionary and frightening implica-
tions for all people involved in solid waste
generation, collection, and disposal. It means
we cannot regard solid waste entirely as some-
thing of little or no value, but rather as a
resource, something to be recovered and reused
wherever possible and practical.
Those of us old enough can well remember
the day of the individual junkman with his horse
and wagon traveling through the streets, holler-
ing out for rags, iron, and what have you. I
sincerely doubt, and sincerely hope, that we
will never revert back to this practice. As we
advanced into a more affluent--effluent economy
and way of living, however, we find that the
individual who collected and even paid for our
unwanted material has never left us.
The secondary material industry is a major
and vital part of our economy and, hopefully, is
in a logarithmic growth stage. The National
Association of Secondary Materials Industries,
Inc. (NASMI), has in the past year taken as its
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theme Recycling Resources, and although the
organization hasn't received much public atten-
tion, they have been of vital importance to
industries with scrap problems. Companies of
NASMI, which recently took "Recycling Resources"
as its theme, have a gross volume in excess of
7 billion dollars. These companies annually
process over 3 million tons of nonferrous scrap
metals for consumption by smelters, refiners,
and ingot makers. They make available 45% of
the copper used in new products, more than 50%
of the domestic lead supply, 30% of all alumi-
num, and 18% of all zinc. Over 11 million tons
of paper stock are recovered and processed by
this industry for reuse. The average company
investment is in excess of $1,300,000, quite a
distinct change from the individual collector
of many years ago.
NASMI is mentioned'not for the purpose of
boosting its image, but to inform you that a
large recycling industry does exist in our
Nation. They are in the recycling business
now; they are heartened by the new national em-
phasis; and, I am certain, they look forward to
meeting the challenge and, of course, to in-
creased business.
RESOURCES IN MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTES
Everyone is or should be aware that the
major component of municipal refuse is paper.
Approximately half of the waste collected in
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our cities is paper of varying quality. Paper
is already recycled at about a 20% level in the
United States; other nations, notably those
with a. short supply of wood pulp, do a far
better job. Japan recycles about half of its
waste paper, and most European countries, such
as West Germany, France, Great Britain, Spain,
recycle approximately one-third of theirs. We
in the Federal solid waste management activities
would be pleased to see our Nation increase its
percentage of reused fibers.
There are, of course, some problems associ-
ated with this concept. The American housewife,
unfortunately, has been lulled into the "better
life and instant age." In fact, a candidate for
mayor in a large municipality based his election
campaign on relieving the housewife of refuse
segregation. This, I understand, was the major
difference between him and his opponent. He
won. But, he won before our national communi-
cation media made "environment" and "ecology"
household words down to the kindergarten level.
One solution that may or may not be the easiest,
goes back to our World War II days of presorting
in homes, offices, and plants. This approach
can provide large quantities of clean waste
paper ready for collection and recycling without
expensive treatment or handling.
A compulsory program recently initiated in
Irvington, New Jersey (a Newark suburb) requires
that householders put their papers separately
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on the curb once a month. Local charities pick
up the paper and gain an added income, and
refuse collection and disposal costs are re-
duced. Most of you, I am sure, have heard of
the voluntary program in Madison, Wisconsin,
where the collection- trucks in the city have
been outfitted with containers to hold bundled
waste papers--a jury-rigged arrangement, to be
sure, but workable.
These approaches are fine for separated
papers, but to make a significant contribution
to recycling materials, a more sophisticated
technology is necessary. Our solid waste pro-
gram has a demonstration grant with the City of
Franklin, Ohio, concerning a commercial system
researched and developed by the Black Clawson
Company, a major producer of paper industry
machines. The Hydrapulper* at the plant at
Franklin, Ohio, will be operational late this
Spring. Some 50 to 70% of the incoming paper,
with an estimated value of $25 per ton, is ex-
pected to be recovered. This estimate is prob-
ably high and will fluctuate with the laws of
supply and demand. Ferrous metals and glass
will also be separated. Hopefully, this process
will be successful and of interest to the
Nation's municipalities.
We are also cooperating with the U.S.
Forest Service's Forest Products Laboratory and
*Mention of commercial products does not
imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.
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the Bureau of Mines on research whose primary
objective is to recover cellulose fibers from
municipal solid waste for direct reuse or new
uses.
All of us are familiar with the amount of
glass in our individual refuse container for
products from the glass industry contribute
significantly to the amount of solid waste
generated. The raw materials for glass manu-
facturing are not in short supply. Because
there's no economic incentive for recycling
glass and it's difficult to use waste glass of
mixed colors, a market is needed that can use
fragmented glass of different grades and colors.
It is pleasing to report that here at the
University of Missouri--Rolla is a solid-waste
supported research grant directed at using
mixed waste glass. I am, of course, referring
to Dr. Ward Malisch's Glasphalt project, which
has received well deserved national and inter-
national publicity and attention. I understand
that the concept came "out of the ranks"—that
the idea was the result of a student class
project. I applaud this resource recovery
thinking and look for more of the same from
this campus.
Glasphalt is not intended to satisfy the
Nation's need for aggregate in road toppings.
Dr. Malisch informs me that if all waste glass
could be recycled, it would be less than 1% of
the asphalt aggregate need. Most municipalities,
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however, operate their own asphalt batching
plants for road patching and resurfacing. Con-
ceivably, cullet could be stored and utilized
at the batching plants for municipal road work,
and the cost of the aggregate and the need for
glass disposal would be reduced. The munici-
pality would have to operate a solid waste
processing system rather than just a collection-
disposal approach. It is hoped that processes
such as the Black Clawson system in Franklin,
Ohio, will produce glass of a quality that can
be used in Glasphalt.
WHAT'S NEW IN THE RESOURCE RECOVERY ACT OF 1970
The Resource Recovery Act of 1970 contains
a few new and many expanded aspects concerning
solid waste. Section 208 of the Act, "Grants
for Resource Recovery Systems and Improved Solid
Waste Disposal Facilities," provides monies to
eligible grantees for the demonstration of
processing "systems" directed at resource re-
covery. Our solid waste office has been
receiving numerous inquiries about support of
systems that practice resource recovery. I
believe that interest in resource recovery for
proper management of our waste materials is
growing and will continue to grow.
The present and growing interest of "big
business" in solid waste management is particu-
larly impressive. Monsanto Company's Enviro-
Chem Subsidiary has researched, tested, and
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reached the marketing stage of a pyrolysis unit.
They are eager to contract for a 1,000 T/day
setup and are willing to finance, construct,
and operate their unit on a "turn-key" basis.
They are confident of their concept, its de-
sign, and their ability to "make it work."
The Hercules Company is concerned with the
whole State of Delaware; they have a contract
with the State to plan, design, and construct a
Statewide solid waste management system.
A recently formed, industry-backed organi-
zation, the National Center for Solid Waste
Disposal, Inc., has accepted (for sponsorship)
the Aluminum Association's concept of resource
recovery. They are proposing a plant with a
capital cost of $15 million that would receive
500 tons of municipal refuse per day. Esti-
mates indicate that 40% of the input could be
recovered and marketed to produce revenues of
$900,000 to $2.1 million that would offset an
estimated $2.4 million annual operating cost.
TECHNOLOGY FOR THE FUTURE
The title for this meeting is "Technology
for the Future to Control Industrial and Urban
Waste," and the announcement bulletin posed a
significant question: "What is the extent of
education and the development of technology to
effect this recycling and control."
Well, the extent to which education is
affecting recycling and control is minimal.
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The Federal solid waste program has funded
graduate-level training grants around our Nation
and, through its highlighting of the solid waste
problem, has acted as a catalyst for other
schools to promote courses in solid waste man-
agement .
Unfortunately, universities such as this
University of Missouri--Rolla, which was formerly
called the Missouri School of Mines and Metal-
lurgy, do not have specific courses directed at
separating and recovering minerals and other
materials from solid wastes. I doubt that there
is a course entitled "Sanitary Landfill Mining,"
or a course involved with extracting metals from
collected municipal solid wastes, or management
courses offered for operating a resource re-
covery system, or economics courses highly
pertinent to the secondary materials industry.
And I am just as certain that the NASMI
companies, municipal, State, and Federal govern-
ments, industry, and indeed the universities
themselves and our research institutions could
utilize well-trained and motivated people in
this field. We are no longer in the garbage
business. We are entering an era of concern,
of needed concern, and involvement about the
quality of our life.
I leave you with a challenge that institu-
tions of higher learning, such as this one
entering its second century, be forward looking
and dedicated in their education and training
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so that engineers and scientists will recognize
and solve the demands of an industrial environ-
ment in an increasingly complex world.
yo576
Environment"1 •"- .-•--,„ >
Library, -.. -~,-i."', ~0n *S
1 Horth 'fc//^ ,,r^,e
Chicago, Illinois'"60606
ft U. S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE' 1 972 —!4
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