Echo
Supply chain slowdown could boost demand for recycled materials
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The same supply chain disruptions that slow Michigan manufacturing could help the recycling industry bring in new business.
Waste
Michigan’s recycling rate lags U.S. average
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Michigan’s estimated overall recycling rate is 18%, which lags considerably behind the national average of 32%. Efforts to update recycling procedures, policies and practices are being made across the state.
Homepage Featured
Pandemic, China trash-ban push recyclers to robots
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There is an emerging new worker that could make a career out of sorting recyclables: robots.
Homepage Featured
Since China won’t buy recyclables, centers look for local markets
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Recycling centers adapting to the loss of China as a market might take a look at what has been going on in Michigan’s Emmet County for decades.
Waste
Michigan tries to boost recycling rate, but critics argue it won’t be enough
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Michigan is offering grants of up to $500,000 to improve local recycling programs. When Emmet County got a similar state grant, it bought new and bigger recycling bins for curbside pickup. The amount of recycling jumped. That’s the kind of improvement the state is hoping for with the new round of grants because its recycling rate is way below national averages.
Homepage Featured
Once a hub for building cities, Muskegon could become one for taking them apart
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Local officials investigate city’s potential as the center of a deconstruction industry. It’s deep water port could play a role.
Catch of the Day
Ontario recycling initiative issues school challenge
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It targets lunchroom waste and school supplies.
Homepage Featured
Michigan lawmakers consider ban on local efforts to tax plastic bags
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Local officials say they need funds for special processing equipment for waste that otherwise degrades recycled products and causes expensive disposal problems.
Supporters of the ban say a statewide law is needed to avoid patchwork regulation that hinders businesses with multiple locations.
Waste
Robot is on a mission to clean up Great Lakes shorelines
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A new robot could change the game for shoreline trash collection. It will be put to the test this summer in Toronto before going on a mission to clean up an island in Lake Ontario.
Waste
New proposal would add deposit to water bottles
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The proposal aims to expand the 40-year-old beverage deposit law to include noncarbonated drinks, with the exceptions of dairy and dairy substitute products.