Industry News

Mergers & Acquisitions

Covanta acquires 2 Massachusetts-based recycling companies

Covanta, an environmental services provider to businesses and communities, says it is adding Globalcycle and Global Remediation Services, both headquartered in East Taunton, Massachusetts, to the company’s portfolio. The company adds that the acquisitions underscore strategic synergies that have marked Covanta’s recent purchases with their proximity to its waste-to-energy facilities in Massachusetts and Connecticut.

Morristown, New Jersey-based Covanta says Globalcycle is the only fully permitted industrial commercial wastewater treatment and recycling plant in Massachusetts. The company recycles wastewater into a reusable water source for industrial applications and processes more than 15 million gallons of wastewater annually for a broad spectrum of customers that includes manufacturers, construction companies and retailers.

Global Remediation Services is an environmental services business that operates along the East Coast. The company’s offerings include site remediation, logistics and disposal, emergency response, marine services and solar field development.

“We share Covanta’s unwavering passion for sustainability and for delivering transformative environmental solutions customers can rely on,” says Tim Burbank, president of Globalcycle and Global Remediation Services. “Globalcycle and Global Remediation Services are thrilled to be joining the Covanta team, not only because of this fundamental alignment but also because our customers will benefit deeply from the breadth of solutions, depth of expertise and quality of service that we will be able to provide together to help businesses meet ambitious circularity goals.”

According to a news release from Covanta, the acquisition of the wastewater treatment, recycling and environmental companies fast-tracks its expansion into the “highly regulated” New England market. It also advances the company’s leadership in sustainable materials management.

Covanta says this deal also improves its ability to provide more last-mile sustainability solutions to remove unwanted byproducts and refuse for its customers and transform them into value-based materials.

These additions bring Covanta’s tally of acquisitions to seven under the direction of Sweden-based EQT Infrastructure, as it comes on the heels of the recent purchases of SGS Recovery, Frontier Fibers and Buffalo Fuel Corp., Miller Environmental Transfer and Biologic Environmental Services and Waste Solutions.

“Covanta is making it possible for companies to meet the challenges of full-cycle sustainability,” Covanta President and CEO Azeez Mohammed says. “[To] achieve full-cycle sustainability, companies must transform their byproducts using advanced sustainable solutions that break down unwanted byproducts into carbon-negative materials that are better for the environment. Adding Globalcycle’s and Global Remediation Services’ capabilities to our lineup further delivers that promise into practice.”

Conversion Technology

Fulcrum BioEnergy produces low-carbon fuel from landfill waste

Fulcrum BioEnergy Inc., a waste-to-energy company based in Pleasanton, California, says it has produced a low-carbon synthetic crude oil using landfill waste as a feedstock at its Sierra BioFuels plant in Nevada.

“This accomplishment is a watershed moment for Fulcrum and opens the door for our plans to transform landfill waste around the world into a low-carbon transportation fuel in a way that will have a profound environmental impact,” Fulcrum President and CEO Eric Pryor says. “After more than a decade of dedication and perseverance, successfully creating a low-carbon fuel entirely from landfill waste validates the strength of our process and our partners’ unwavering belief in and support for our business model.

“We aim to replicate our success at Sierra with cost-efficient net-zero carbon plants nationally and ultimately around the globe,” Pryor adds.

According to a news release from Fulcrum, its milestone comes as the world has convened on emissions reduction goals, the Biden administration has prioritized the development of lower-carbon transportation methods and the aviation industry has set its sights on net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

Fulcrum says it is committed to supporting these objectives and has entered into strategic partnerships with major airlines, including United and Japan Airlines, and other offtake partners to purchase its renewable fuel.

According to Fulcrum, by producing a synthetic crude oil product that can be refined into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), the company has demonstrated its process and is preparing to supply SAF to its strategic partners.

Fulcrum says it has spent more than a decade and significant capital developing a process for transforming a true waste product into a valuable low-carbon transportation fuel for the aviation industry.

Fulcrum says it expects to use a standardized, scalable and low-cost approach for future projects, replicating the successful process at Sierra.

The company says its process capitalizes on the intellectual property Fulcrum has developed in its engineering and startup operations for this plant, which is the first of its kind.

The company says it is making progress on its planned growth program, which Fulcrum expects will have the capacity to produce approximately 400 million gallons of net-zero carbon transportation fuel annually.

Fulcrum BioEnergy’s development program includes the Centerpoint BioFuels Plant in Gary, Indiana; the Trinity Fuels Plant in the Texas Gulf Coast region; and the NorthPoint project in the United Kingdom.

Medical Waste

Oklahoma launches sharps takeback program

The Choctaw Nation, Indian Health Services and Covanta Environmental Solutions, based in New Jersey, have joined forces with the Product Stewardship Institute (PSI), a policy advocate and consulting nonprofit, to expand sharps takeback infrastructure in Oklahoma.

Through the program, participating health clinics in eight areas will provide sharps users with containers that allow them to drop off or mail in their used sharps. More than 100,000 residents generate as many as 60 million needles per year. 

When needles are flushed or thrown in the trash, they pose health and safety risks to residents, sanitation workers, sewage treatment plant operators, waste management personnel and hospitality workers. According to a 2018 report from the Environmental Research and Education Foundation and the Solid Waste Association of North America, 53 percent of material recovery facilities observed needles in household waste at least weekly, and more than half reported one or more needle-stick injuries in 2016.

“The implementation of a sharps mail-back program in Oklahoma is a big step forward in helping remove this material from households,” says Brad Wright, vice president and general manager of healthcare solutions at Covanta. “This grant will ensure that the public will have access to disposal containers, which will then be managed and processed in the most sustainable manner possible.”

This collection program is informed by PSI’s how-to guide: “Establishing Community Medical Sharps Programs: A Guide for Municipalities, Pharmacies, Health Clinics and Nonprofits in Oklahoma.” 

The guide, created with grant funding from the state’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), provides step-by-step support for municipalities establishing medical sharps collection programs for residents and will be expanded with lessons learned from the pilot collection programs, PSI says.

Research for the guide highlighted the lack of infrastructure for medical sharps collection, leading to this pilot.

“In addition to the public health and environmental risks, medical sharps that are thrown in the trash can pose a safety hazard to sanitation workers,” says Patrick Riley, environmental programs manager for solid waste and sustainability at the Oklahoma DEQ. “We know that safe collection sites are needed, and this program will demonstrate exactly how they can be operated.” 

Oklahoma’s new program is part of a nationwide push for health-care-related extended producer responsibility (EPR) programs and legislation. In April, Illinois became the eighth U.S. state to enact an EPR law that requires drug manufacturers to pay for and run a statewide take-back program.

Safety

Refuse and recyclable materials collection less deadly than a year ago

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) has released its 2021 National Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, which shows refuse and recyclable materials collection is now the seventh-deadliest job. This is a decrease from 2020, when the industry placed sixth in deadliest occupations.

This reduction in worker fatalities is consistent with the 2021 report from the Solid Waste Association of North America (SWANA), which showed a significant decline compared with 2020. The BLS 2021 Survey of Occupational Injuries and Illnesses released in November 2022 also shows historically low injury and illness rates for collection, landfill and material recovery facility (MRF) workers.

However, data for 2022 from Silver Spring, Maryland-based SWANA is indicating a return to higher levels of worker fatalities, suggesting that the drop in 2021 might be an aberration because of the pandemic.

“Although we are pleased by the industry’s improvement last year, being the seventh-deadliest occupation in the United States is nothing to brag about,” says David Biderman, SWANA executive director and CEO. “The uptick in fatal incidents in 2022 suggests that SWANA’s focus on safety as part of its new Forward Together Strategic Plan is both timely and necessary. Nothing we do at SWANA is more important than making sure the hard-working men and women in this great industry go home to their loved ones at the end of the day.”

Solid waste collection saw further reductions in workplace fatalities, falling to 34 reported in 2021 compared with 38 in 2020. This continues a downward trend from a high of 57 in 2018. Fatalities among workers at MRFs remained steady at four reported in 2021. No solid waste landfill worker fatalities were reported in 2021 by BLS, but SWANA says it is aware of at least five workers who died at landfills that year.

“While the trend was pointing downward during 2021, it is clear from current evidence in 2022, we have much work to do [to] fall out of the top 10 most-dangerous industries,” Suzanne Sturgeon, SWANA National Safety Committee chair and SCS Engineers’ safety manager, says. “From my perspective, situational awareness is the key element to getting our workers home to their families unharmed.”

She adds that good communication by decision-makers with employees in the field is essential to their understanding of how to conduct themselves.

Across all workplaces, 5,190 fatal injuries were recorded in 2021, an 8.9 percent increase from 4,764 in 2020.

The fatal work injury rate was 3.6 fatalities per 100,000 full-time equivalents, the highest annual rate since 2016. Transportation incidents remained the most frequent type of fatal event in 2021 with 1,982 fatal injuries, an increase of 11.5 percent from 2020.

Municipal

Kent County, Michigan, to construct transfer station

Kent County, Michigan, residents and waste haulers soon will have a safer facility to drop off recycling and waste. 

The Kent County Department of Public Works (DPW) is planning to construct a transfer station in Plainfield Township, Michigan. The board approved a $15.9 million budget for the transfer station. Construction is slated to be completed in spring 2024. The DPW has been planning the new facility for several years, and the project will not incur any debt.

The current transfer station at that site opened in 1992. Because of population and business growth in northern Kent County, it must be replaced with a larger transfer station that will meet recycling and disposal needs. 

“Because the site has become much busier since it opened and transactions have nearly doubled in the last few years, we are looking forward to a safer and more efficient way for residents and haulers to properly dispose of materials,” Kent County DPW Director Dar Baas says. “Increasing the ease and safety of waste drop-off will help in our ambitious goal of reducing landfill waste.” 

Kent County’s transfer station is used to hold municipal solid waste before the materials head to their final destinations. A larger facility will allow residents and commercial haulers to more easily segregate construction and demolition debris and recycling and bulky items from municipal solid waste. 

Ultimately, that will allow for more efficiency when repurposing materials and diverting them from a landfill. This falls in line with the DPW’s goal of reducing landfill waste by 90 percent by 2030.

Additionally, the transfer station is part of Kent County’s plans to build a more integrated waste management system, including a proposed future Sustainable Business Park. 

The DPW provides municipal solid waste disposal services to ensure the effective removal, storage and disposal of residential and commercial solid waste through various facilities and programs, including waste-to-energy infrastructure, a recycling and education center, a transfer station and a landfill.