In what appears to have been a home-court advantage, Waste Industries USA, Inc. (www.waste-ind.com) beat the favored incumbent, Tennessee-based Santek Environmental (www.santekenviro.com), to win the contract to operate Wake County's new Holly Springs landfill. Even the landfill itself is controversial since the county wrestled through 12 years of lawsuits to decide on its expansion despite a compelling opposition from the community, including questions of environmental justice. The operating contract was surprising since county staff had already recommended Santek's lower bid of $164.5 million. However, Waste Industries executives stressed that the company has been hauling trash in Wake County since 1971, was responsible for most waste brought to the landfill, and would be nearby if any problems ever arose...Read More »
US Steel Recycling Hits 75.7% Setting New Record
According to the Steel Recycling Institute (SRI), the US recycled 75.7 percent of its steel in 2005 making it the most recycled material. This is the highest rate ever recorded in the US and is a 5% increase over that of 2004. This translates into 76 million tons of domestic steel scrap that was charged into furnaces, both in the US and abroad, to make new steel products...Read More »
EnergySolutions Completes $396 Million Acquisition of Duratek
EnergySolutions, LLC has completed its acquisition of Duratek, Inc. (Nasdaq: DRTK) for $396 Million. Former stockholders of Duratek will receive $22 in cash, without interest, for each share of Duratek common stock. Both companies are in the nuclear waste disposal business. Steve Creamer, CEO of EnergySolutions, stated "Duratek is an integral part of our company and our objective to be a major international nuclear service supplier committed to meeting the needs of government and the nuclear industry."...Read More »
Emerald Waste Services Makes Two Acquisitions in Northwest Florida
Emerald Waste Services, a WHI Capital Company, having only days before changed its name from Waste Recyclers Holdings, has made two new acquisitions. In strengthening its Northwest Florida presence, Emerald has acquired local companies Disposal Depot, Inc. and MB Environmental, Inc.
With the acquisition of Disposal Depot's permitted 60-acre construction and demolition (C&D) landfill site, Emerald now owns six of the region's eight sites, making it by far the area's largest site owner with more than 28 million cubic yards of C&D landfill capacity...Read More »
EPA Releases Scrap Tire Cleanup Guidebook
The US EPA and the Illinois EPA have coauthored the "Scrap Tire Cleanup Guidebook, A Resource for Solid Waste Managers Across the United States." The guidebook seeks to address a dilemma. Even though an estimated 80% of the 290 million discarded tires are recycled every year, the remaining 20% or nearly 60 million tires end up being stockpiled or dumped. The guidebook aims to help its target audience of tire manufacturers, state and local government, regulators, auto recyclers and collectors to come up with viable solutions that take into consideration among other things: examples of successful programs and avenues of funding, legal issues, cost recovery, secondary markets, cleanup and project management...Read More »
Berkeley County (SC) Landfill to Provide Methane (Green Energy) to Aluminum Smelter
A $5 million project will capture methane gas generated by the Berkeley County landfill in South Carolina, for sale to Mount Holly-based JW Aluminum, for use in powering a new metal smelter. The smelter is one of an estimated 400 projects throughout the country that use methane as an energy source. About a third of those involve green-powered businesses comparable to the JW Aluminum expansion...Read More »
Carlyle/Riverstone Fund Acquires Interest in Bottle Rock Power Corporation
Carlyle/Riverstone Renewable Energy Infrastructure Fund, part of the Carlyle Group, has acquired a significant stake in Bottle Rock Power LLC, a California-based company whose principal asset is a 55-megawatt geothermal power station in the Geysers in Lake County. The acquisition constitutes one of the first investments by the $685 million capitalized fund.
Bottle Rock plans to continue to refurbish the facility with plans to restart before the end of 2007 when it expects to produce approximately 260,000 megawatt hours per year of base load renewable power for sale to Pacific Gas and Electric under a long-term power purchase agreement. This is enough energy on average to supply electricity to over 21,000 California homes without the typical pollutants that result from the combustion of fossil fuels...Read More »
Green Power Celebrates Successful Test of its Waste-to-Diesel Technology
On June 2nd 2006, Green Power, Inc. (www.cleanenergyprojects.com) successfully demonstrated its technology to convert regular solid waste into diesel fuel. The process called "catalytic depolymerisation" is capable of converting all regular waste, save the metals, into high quality diesel fuel. The City of Cheyenne, WY (www.cheyennecity.org) is an early adopter and hosted the demonstration in front of a crowd of 100...Read More »
Waste Agency Regional Waste Systems to Change its Name to ECOMAINE
No doubt tired of sounding like a private company, Regional Waste Systems' board elected to change its name to a more environmentally friendly sounding ECOMAINE. The agency serves 27 municipalities and is owned by 21 of them. Much of the waste is transported to the agency's waste-to-energy plant in Portland ME where it is converted to electricity that is in turn sold to Constellation Energy Group. The name change is the latest step in the agency's effort to reorganize, operate more efficiently and expand its already extensive recycling efforts...Read More »
Waste Management of Ohio Donates Truck to the University of Northwestern Ohio's Diesel Program
Waste Management of Ohio has donated a WM truck to the University of Northwestern Ohio's Diesel Program. The University, which started the first Diesel Program in the state of Ohio in 1973, was very excited to receive the new training aid, valued at over $160,000, for the students studying Diesel Technology. "The partnership we have with Waste Management reinforces each of our organization's belief in the value of higher education," said University President, Dr. Jeffrey A. Jarvis. As part of the partnership, Waste Management's Fleet Manager will be working with the students each quarter teaching them how to operate the truck and also the various safety features...Read More »
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