While recent news in recycling has been discouraging due to China’s National Sword and other foreign imported scrap bans, Berg Mill is ever committed to keeping your recyclables moving.
Despite a myriad of challenges – such as the switch from duel to single stream recycling, the rising levels of contamination, as well as a lowered contamination acceptance rate for imports, and the closing of foreign doors to imported scrap materials – U.S. recycling has adapted and changed radically to compensate for a rapidly changing industry and will continue to do so.
While import halts and regulations may have disrupted the status quo for U.S. recycling programs, they have also challenged them to update their infrastructure, increase and educate their staff and customers, and strive to do more recycling at home.
Ultimately, domestic recycling has the potential to become superior to importing scrap both economically and environmentally. Cutting down on exports will cut down on transportation costs and fuel pollution, and even if scrap is still exported, it can be sold at a higher price to foreign buyers if it is processed domestically.
At its current market price, scrap is cheap and ample, making now a perfect time for U.S. paper mills to expand their capacity and industry. Not to mention, international partners in recycling and reuse aren’t going away.
In fact, Chinese companies are still seeking paper as raw material for manufacturing—they may just have to pay more for it to be processed within U.S. borders first.
Investments in U.S. paper processing plants are flourishing, rated at roughly $1 billion dollars in just the last six months. Many of these investments are coming from China, Hong Kong, and other previous international scrap buyers.
Within the last year, Nine Dragons invested $500 million to buy and expand paper mills in Maine, Wisconsin, and West Virginia. These investments create U.S. jobs and jumpstart the domestic recycling industry with profitable means.
But domestic markets for recycled scrap are just the beginning of the rebirth of the recycling industry. It’s up to consumers, retailers, and manufacturers to put their demand into products created from recyclable materials in order to drive revenue and make sustainability profitable.
Berg Mill has a long history as one of the pioneers in the industry, and we are not going anywhere even when faced with recyclable import changes. If you continue to handle large amounts of recycled waste and are looking for solutions to offload idle scrap, please contact our industry veterans at Berg Mill supply via our website or phone at 866-333-BERG. Talk to us about purchasing any and all of your scrap paper, plastic, metal, textiles, glass grades, and many more.
