NRRA Newsletter - Full of Scrap

Full of Scrap Newsletter- March 10, 2021

Your source for recycling & waste reduction news in the Northeast (and beyond).

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Help Us Celebrate NRRA's 40th Anniversary!

Celebrating 40 Years of Making Recycling Strong

Did you know that 2021 marks NRRA's 40th anniversary? In 1981, four New Hampshire municipalities founded the Northeast Resource Recovery Association, then called the New Hampshire Resource Recovery Association, to provide a clearinghouse for current, up-to-date information and a source of technical and marketing assistance in the general areas of waste reduction and recycling. Since then, membership in NRRA has grown to include over 400 municipalities, individuals, and businesses in New England. We're asking our members to help us celebrate our 40th anniversary by sharing how NRRA has benefited your community. We'll then share some of these testimonials on our website, in future Full of Scrap newsletters, and other communications throughout 2021.

How to Participate & Share Your Story

NRRA's 2021 Annual Recycling Conference!

May 10th & May 11th

8:00 AM - 12:00 PM

It's a new year, and NRRA's newly designed conference will be held virtually over two mornings: Monday, May 10th and Tuesday, May 11th from 8:00 am-noon. We are inviting solid waste and recycling operators and supervisors, department of public works staff, town administrators, select board members, recycling committee members, school teachers, school administrators and students, and residents interested in recycling and waste reduction to join us.

There is something for everyone at this annual event. Be sure to join our conference mailing list to receive updates!

Our conference theme, "Recycling with Results", will explore how the material you put in the recycling bin travels from your home to the recycling center, then to the mill and what new products are made from it! Our agenda of planned workshops is posted on our website, with more details to come!

These workshops are being offered for free to our existing municipal members and associate members. Yet-to-be-members will pay one price of $75 (for both days). Dr. Ben Locwin, a healthcare executive and international COVID-19 advisor living in Portsmouth, NH, will be one of our speakers. The conference will count toward NHDES continuing education credits for each hour attended (live) and certificates of attendance will be awarded.

Sponsors Wanted!

The Northeast Resource Recovery Association’s Annual Conference is successful because of the dedication, commitment and generosity of the businesses and organizations that participate as sponsors. Sponsorship ensures high visibility and recognition among attendees and allows NRRA to offer this virtual conference for free for NRRA members. Check out our Sponsorship Opportunities to see how you can support this year's event!

NRRA's 2021 Compost Bin Sale - RSVP by April 8, 2021

NRRA Annual Compost Bin Sale is Back for 2021!

Individuals are more likely to compost their food scraps if they have the tools/equipment readily accessible at their home. Help offset the amount of food scraps ending up in your town's MSW by offering Compost Bin Sale items for sale to your residents!

Items Available to Order: Compost Bins; Compost Turners; Rain Barrels; Kitchen Pails (MUST ORDER in full pallets)

Why should NRRA municipal members consider participating in this compost bin sale? Food scraps are heavy, and therefore expensive to dispose of as municipal solid waste. Nationwide, food scraps comprise 24% by weight of the material going into our landfills, which makes food scraps the largest single material by weight that we landfill as a country (based on the Environmental Protection Agency's most recent data from 2018). So encouraging your residents to compost could help your community save taxpayer money by decreasing your cost of disposal. In addition, composting food scraps also benefits the environment because food scraps in landfills create methane gas, a powerful greenhouse gas.

Read More & Sign Up!

Why Have Trucking Costs Increased Lately?

Member Services Representatives noticed that trucking prices have recently increased, so we reached out to Mike Schafer, Sales Team Leader at Total Quality Logistics (TQL) to ask why. Basically, there are a lot more full tractor trailer loads of recyclables available right now than there are trucks. Once COVID-19 started and businesses shut down, there were many more trucks than there were loads due to all of the closings and businesses not shipping material. Those factors drove the cost of trucking March-June of 2020 way down to where drivers weren’t making a whole lot of money and it put about 80,000 of them out of business. That’s why the hauling market started to tighten up in the second half of last year.

After the unusual frozen temperatures in Texas, there were a large number of trucks stuck down there unable to get loads off of their trucks due to road conditions, power outages, and diesel shortage. This had a ripple effect across the country that is still being felt because these trucks couldn’t get out of Texas to other areas of the country to pick up loads, causing tightness all over the place. Whenever there are more loads than there are trucks, the carriers know they can hold out for higher rates and basically hold their truck for the highest bidder.

MassRecycle Podcast: NRRA Provides "A Regional Perspective of COVID on the Recycling Landscape"

In October 2020, NRRA Executive Director Reagan Bissonnette recorded a MassRecycle Podcast episode with Gretchen Carey and Waneta Trabert, President and Vice President of MassRecycle. They discussed NRRA's glass recycling programs, including NRRA's new glass recycling StoryMap, which shows how over 100 municipalities in NH, VT and MA are successfully recycling glass for over 500,000 residents.

They also talked about how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted municipal solid waste and recycling facility operations, as well as recycling markets. The 35-minute episode was recently published and is available for anyone to listen. Reagan also took the opportunity to share NRRA's appreciation for the work of solid waste operators during the pandemic. Thank you to our solid waste operators! We appreciate the essential work you do.

Listen to the Episode

Information Sheets

Check out our information sheet on Rolloff / Compactor / Trailer Companies for our suggestions on several equipment vendors!

Information Sheets are a collection of valuable company recommendations for transfer station equipment/products and services, as well as instructions to commonly asked questions related to recycling - all sorted by topic. You can find these in the "Resource Library" section of our website.

View Our Library of Information Sheets

Upcoming Events

Wednesday, April 7, 2021, 9:00 AM to 12:00 PM - Increasing Waste Diversion - Beyond Recycling

This NH Dept. of Environmental Services sponsored virtual workshop will cover waste diversion and why it is important, how communities can calculate their waste diversion rates, and specific strategies and examples of how New Hampshire municipalities can reduce their waste. Reagan Bissonnette & Bonnie Bethune will present.

Learn More and Register

Friday, April 9, 2021, 8:45 AM to 12:30 PM - EBC Eighth Annual New England "Talking Trash" Conference

NRRA is partnering with EBC, SWANA, MassRecycle, ecomaine, and NWRA to present the eighth annual Talking Trash conference, which will focus and reflect on the changing landscape of solid waste industry operations in New England. NRRA Executive Director Reagan Bissonnette is one of the conference co-chairs and will participate in a panel discussion with other industry leaders.

Learn More

Thursday, April 22, 2021, 9:00 AM - 12:00 PM -

Recycling 101: Municipal Solid Waste & Recycling in New Hampshire

NRRA staff will be leading a new virtual workshop, "Recycling 101: Municipal Solid Waste & Recycling in New Hampshire" for the NH Municipal Association on Earth Day - April 22, 2021 from 9 AM to 12 PM. This workshop is designed for all municipal staff, including public works, finance, town administrators, and select board members.

What is the current state of municipal recycling and solid waste management in New Hampshire? What does the future hold for municipal budgets with respect to recycling and solid waste? Is recycling still worthwhile for New Hampshire municipalities?

Join Reagan Bissonnette and Heather Herring of the Northeast Resource Recovery Association (NRRA) for an in-depth workshop on solid waste, recycling, and waste reduction for NH municipalities.

Learn More and Register

NRRA Summer Webinar Recording Spotlight:

The Messy Truth about Students and Their Garbage

On average, students produce 1.5 pounds of waste every single day. What does that mean? Well for example, a high school with 535 students did a waste composition study and calculated their waste generation to be 72 tons/year. This is equal to (on average) five and a half school buses!

NRRA's Star of Sustainability provides schools with the preliminary tools necessary to assess present waste management practices. The Star evaluates the sustainability of school recycling programs. Schools get clear, unbiased suggestions for future improvement as well as a baseline for examination of the positive effects of changes.