Saint-Gobain installs gypsum recycling technology at Arkansas plant

Building materials manufacturer Saint-Gobain, with North American headquarters in Malvern, Pennsylvania, through its building products subsidiary, CertainTeed LLC, Malvern, has installed recycling technology at its gypsum wallboard plant in Nashville, Arkansas.   

According to a news release by Saint-Gobain, the technology will allow the plant to recycle 65,000 tons of materials annually that otherwise would have been sent to a landfill.  

The project represents a $1.3 million investment from CertainTeed and comes as Saint-Gobain continues to roll out its global "Grow and Impact" strategy. This includes reducing waste and increasing the circularity of raw materials at its manufacturing sites.  

Gypsum wallboard is made from a gypsum slurry that is poured and dried between two sheets of paper. Some scrap materials, consisting of gypsum and paper, are normally created every time a production line is started up or shut down, or when production equipment is changed to manufacture different sizes of wallboard.  

The new recycling technology works by grinding the waste gypsum and wastepaper down into fine particles, allowing the plant to capture and internally recycle the materials. Then the materials are sorted and reintroduced to the production process at the plant. Saint-Gobain says each wallboard produced at CertainTeed’s Nashville facility includes some recycled content made available by this process. The company plans to increase the number of recycled materials in its gypsum wallboard in the coming years.  

“In Nashville and at our manufacturing sites around the world, we remain laser-focused on reducing waste, reducing our consumption of natural resources, and increasing recycling and circularity throughout our value chain,” says Jay Bachmann, vice president and general manager of CertainTeed Gypsum. “We will continue to look for ways to minimize our environmental footprint while maximizing our company’s positive impact on our customers and the communities where we do business.”  

CertainTeed’s Nashville plant, and its nearby mine, sit on 3,500 acres of land in southwest Arkansas. Today the plant and the mine employ about 200 people and are currently hiring mechanical engineers, process engineers, reliability engineers and for several roles in the production. A complete listing of job openings at all Saint-Gobain locations, including the CertainTeed site in Nashville, can be found on the company’s careers website.  

Last year, the company installed recycling technology at its gypsum wallboard plant in Silver Grove, Kentucky. The technology will allow the plant to recycle 15,000 tons of paper per year that otherwise would have been sent to a landfill.