Source: http://dallasdumpsternews.com/?m=201410
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 00:41:12+00:00

Document:
Trick Or Treat: Are You Being Tricked By Your Home Cleaning Products?
The post Trick Or Treat: Are You Being Tricked By Your Home Cleaning Products? appeared first on Earth911.com.
The post Lions, Tigers and Pumpkins, Oh My! Pumpkin Donation For The Beasts appeared first on Earth911.com.
The beverage container recycling arm of The Coca-Cola Company – Coca-Cola Recycling – is "winding down," the company this week confirmed.
The Coca-Cola Company’s current goal is to lead the industry in packaging sustainability including PlantBottle, reducing our packaging footprint and increasing recovery, and using recyclable materials. In the U.S., we will continue to work more directly with our value chain to increase the use of recycled materials. As the industry is evolving, we no longer need to directly engage in the buying and selling of recyclable materials. We are excited about the opportunities this will create and remain committed to broad-based sustainability initiatives in North America.
Coca-Cola remains committed to using recyclable materials in our packaging and advancing recycling. We are restructuring how we procure recyclable materials and will focus on developing our sources of supply. Coca-Cola will continue to work with our suppliers, customers and the industry to increase recycled content in our packaging.
Coca-Cola Recycling was active nationwide in the recovery and marketing of aluminum and PET beverage containers. On the aluminum side, the firm purchased used beverage cans (UBCs) for conversion into can sheet. Some of the firm’s UBC buyers were formerly employed by Anheuser-Busch in a similar arrangement designed to help control can sheet prices. Several UBC suppliers to Coca-Cola Recycling expect this side of the operation to continue for a short period due to existing supply and melting agreements.
While the firm’s moves around UBCs were lauded by some, some other aspects of Coca-Cola Recycling, particularly those surrounding PET, have been criticized. For example, the firm made what turned out to be an ill-advised investment in a PET reclamation plant in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Not only was the plant’s technology untested, according to some industry players, the firm had an ambitious goal by wanting to produce food-grade recycled resin solely from curbside-collected PET bottles. A competitor in the Southeast said recently at a meeting of the Association of Postconsumer Plastic Recyclers that "Coke’s refusal to use some deposit-grade containers doomed the plant."
In addition to seeking curbside-collected containers, Coca-Cola Recycling also targeted out-of-home cans and bottles. Until the recent decision to end the program, the company’s Reimagine Beverage Containers recycling centers employed reverse-vending machines to provide vouchers to consumers using the machines. Nonetheless, after four years, the system was only able to capture about 25,000 containers per day and, recently the company stated that "the pilot program is ending and we are closing the centers while we perform a detailed analysis of the results and determine our course of action moving forward."
The company also noted its ongoing support of the Recycling Bin Grant Program, through which it partners with Keep America Beautiful, and the company said it "has placed more than 238,000 recycle bins in communities and customer locations across North America since 2008."
Robinson further pointed out that the company joined the Walmart-led Closed Loop Fund "to help provide more Americans with access to recycling infrastructure, while decreasing the materials deposited in landfills."
Falling natural (dairy) scrap bales prices are pressuring natural pellet prices lower in late October.
HDPE homopolymer natural pellets sold recently for 80 to 83 cents per pound FOB southern U.S. That range was around 4 cents per pound lower than the range at the beginning of October.
Meanwhile, prices for HDPE natural bales have fallen to the lowest level since mid-April due to increased availability. Business for natural bottles from curbside was done at 47 cents per pound FOB southern U.S. last week, with slightly lower offers being heard later.
For a free trial to the Repro/Regrind Resin Report or to see sample issues of all PCW reports visit the PetroChem Wire website at http://ift.tt/1cw4K2K. You can also contact Cindy Bryan at cindy@petrochemwire.com or (713) 385-1407.
With some pundits criticizing "demonstrably false" ads opposing the expansion of Massachusetts’ beverage container deposit program to include water bottles, supporters of the bigger bottle bill are staging rallies to help pass the voter referendum.
Question 2 on the ballots that Massachusetts voters will see next Tuesday concerns the expansion of the Bay State’s beverage container deposit redemption program to include all non-carbonated, non-alcoholic beverage containers, save for those containing dairy, infant formula or medications.
The possibility of a nickel deposit on water bottles and sports drinks – among others – seemingly wouldn’t be front-page news in consumer media, but opponents to the measure have used what some are calling unfair or flat-out misleading advertisements.
"It’s beyond me why a campaign with smart advisers and mountains of money would peddle a message so demonstrably false," wrote Boston Globe columnist Thomas Farragher, noting that bottle bill opponents were claiming 90 percent access to curbside recycling for Massachusetts residents when, according to Farragher, a more accurate figure would be closer to 65 percent.
With election day coming up on Tuesday, Nov. 4, supporters of Question 2 are holding rallies around the state using a 25-foot inflatable bottle to help get the word out and opponents to the expansion are taking to social media to fight it.
A look at trade data from the first seven months of 2014 shows a continued rebound from Green Fence-era levels of scrap plastics exports.
July, the most recent month for which figures are available, saw a 2.5 percent decline from June 2014 export levels, with 395.16 million pounds of scrap plastics exported in July 2014. However, when matched against Green Fence-influenced July 2013 levels, the volume of plastic scrap exports was up by a robust 19.5 percent.
That year-over-year (YOY) growth was similar to June 2014 scrap plastic levels, which were up 23 percent compared with June 2013.
The weighted price of recovered plastic exports in July, at 19.63 cents per pound, was up by 1.4 percent from its June 2014 standing of 19.36. When compared with its year-over-year (YOY) level, the price was down by 3.9 percent.
Through July, at 2.72 billion pounds, the volume of recovered plastics exported was up 15.0 percent from its 2013 year-to-date (YTD) figure. At 19.66 cents per pound, however, the average price for the first seven months of 2014 was down 3.5 percent from its 2013 YTD standing.
A corrosive-proof coating for piping made of crumb rubber is the subject of Patent No. 8,853,303, given to King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals of Dhahran, Saudi Arabia.
Patent No. 8,855,809 was given to Bedford, Massachusetts’ Spectramet LLC for a X-Ray fluorescence sortation device.
Dalton, Georgia’s TexTile Rubber & Chemical Co., Inc. was given Patent No. 8,809,405 for a method of recycling synthetic turf.
Patent No. 8,820,666 was given to Shawano, Wisconsin’s Wisconsin Film & Bag, Inc. for a method recovering and recycling post-consumer scrap film.
Universitat Ulm from Ulm, Germany, was awarded Patent No. 8,835,573 for a method of making a composite plastic from scrap materials.
Patent No. 8,835,594 was given to Erema Engineering Recycling Maschinen und Anlagen Gesellschaft m.b.H from Ansfelden, Austria for a method and apparatus for processing of plastic materials.
A device that removes labels from bottles is the subject of Patent No. 8,839,596, given to Dortmund, Germany’s KHS GmbH.
Ten Cate Thiolon B.V. from Nijverdal, The Netherlands was given Patent Application No. 20140287843 for a method of preparing and shredding recovered plastics to be used as a substrate for a sports field.
Ansfelden, Austria’s Erema Engineering Recycling Maschinen und Anlagen Gesellschaft M.B.H developed a method and apparatus for the continuous agglomeration of scrap plastics, the subject of Patent Application No. 20140291427. The company was also given Patent Application Nos. 20140299700, 20140287081, 20140234461 and 20140234462 for four other apparatuses that process and compound scrap plastics.
Patent Application No. 20140294238, which describes a method of inspecting containers made from recycled plastic materials for contaminants, such as glass fragments, was awarded to Krones AG from Neutraubling, Germany.
Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc., headquartered in Tokyo, was given Patent Application No. 20140296383 for a method of making printer and copier parts out of recycled flame-retardant plastics.
Electrostatic sortation of scrap plastic materials is the subject of Patent Application No. 20140299517, which was awarded to Wilmington, Delaware’s Empire Technology Development LLC.
Patent Application No. 20140305853, given to Alfatect S.R.L. from Tradate, Italy, concerns an automatic screen changer for scrap plastics processing machinery.
The Boeing Company of Seal Beach, California was awarded Patent Application No. 20140308519 for a method of compounding different types of scrap plastics and other materials using thermoplastic stabilizing materials.
For more information on these or any patents, please consult the U.S. Patent Office database online.
Copies of patents can be ordered by number for $3 each from the Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, P.O. Box 1450, Alexandria, VA, 22313-1450.
Beyond asserting that foam is valuable as a recycled commodity, the video could have some impact on the current debate going on in New York City and elsewhere regarding the merit of including foam products in municipal recycling programs.
Following a global trend to ban plastic checkout bags, France has introduced legislation that would impose a country-wide bag ban by 2016. If approved by the country’s Senate, it would go down as one of the most significant bans yet and could encourage other countries to consider similar legislation. California recently became the first U.S. state to ban the grocery store staple.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has sent out letters to 15 makers of bags marketed as "oxodegradable," warning them that the label may be misleading consumers. "If marketers don’t have reliable scientific evidence for their claims, they shouldn’t make them," said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, in the announcement. "Claims that products are environmentally friendly influence buyers, so it’s important they be accurate."
Publicly traded composite lumber company Trex has released third-quarter financials for 2014, showing significant year-over-year improvement. Total revenues for the quarter reached a record $95.5 million, up 32 percent from last year’s third-quarter showing, and revenues for all of 2014 are expected to near $400 million, according to market research firm Zacks.
An administrative law judge has ruled that "massive regulatory failure" led to groundwater contamination in a dairy farming region and that the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources must take steps to prevent further pollution.

References: Application No. 20140287843
 Application No. 20140291427
 Application No. 20140294238
 Application No. 20140296383
 Application No. 20140299517
 Application No. 20140305853
 Application No. 20140308519