The U.S. recycling industry is breaking down.
Prices for scrap paper and plastic have collapsed, leading local officials across the country to charge residents more to collect recyclables and send some to landfills. Used newspapers, cardboard boxes and plastic bottles are piling up at plants that can’t make a profit processing them for export or domestic markets.
. . . Sacramento County, which collects trash and recyclables from 151,000 homes, used to earn $1.2 million a year selling the scrap to Waste Management and another processor from scrap. Now, the county is paying what will amount to about $1 million a year, or roughly $35 a ton, to defray the processors’ costs. Waste Management paid the county $250,000 to break the revenue-sharing contract and negotiate those terms.
County waste management director Doug Sloan expects those costs to keep climbing. “We’ve been put on notice that we need to do our part,” he said. The county hasn’t yet raised residential fees.
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