The president of the Georgia-Pacific subsidiary hopes his company’s technologies will sooner or later address stagnant recycling prices nationwide. | Courtesy of Georgia-Pacific

Georgia-Pacific’s Juno Technologies is testing out plant areas and partnerships by way of a Seattle pilot project. 

The technologies, which targets traditionally unrecyclable fiber, is becoming place to use in a 12-week pilot project to recycle material sourced from King County, Washington that started on Feb. 28, according to a press release. 

Juno utilizes a patented wet waste processing resolution that separates, sanitizes and washes fiber contaminated with meals and other organic debris. It can manage cups with plastic coatings and paper-primarily based packaging, as properly as divert much more metals and plastics and send them back into the recycling program. Organics are turned into biogas. 

Christer Henriksson, president of Juno, told Resource Recycling, “We take what ever falls amongst the cracks and we then get a different stab at it.” 

King County, which sits in the heart of the Seattle metro region, estimated that regardless of “robust curbside recycling applications,” more than 600,000 tons of recyclable material finish up in landfills just about every year. The Strong Waste Division is testing how Juno could assist cut down that quantity, the press release noted. 

Juno has been operating a plant on 3 acres in Toledo, Ore. given that 2021, Henriksson mentioned, close to the Georgia-Pacific containerboard facility in the very same town. Considering the fact that then, Juno has tripled landfill diversion prices in Toledo, the press release noted. 

The facility has an annual capacity of 60,000 to 70,000 tons. King County is sending about 1,000 total tons of material to the facility more than the 12-week period.  

Pat McLaughlin, King County’s Strong Waste Division director, mentioned in the press release that “mixed waste processing, alongside other waste reduction, prevention and recycling initiatives, has the prospective to be an critical piece of our lengthy-term plans to cut down the quantity of garbage going to the landfill and decrease our carbon footprint right here in King County.”

For Juno, the pilot will also assist the enterprise “properly make a decision on a future plant, potentially, for King County that could then assist them divert up to about 90% away from landfills,” Henriksson mentioned. 

Hunting at the larger image

Recycling prices in the U.S. have largely been stagnant more than the previous two decades, Henriksson mentioned, and he thinks Juno can assist adjust that. 

“The typical recycling price in the U.S. is in the low 30s, so a fantastic neighborhood can hit about 50%,” Henriksson mentioned. “With anything like Juno, we could then method the other 50% and recycle it, diverting up to about 90%, so it would be a significant needle mover.” 

There’s a lot of interest in Juno appropriate now, Henriksson noted, so the enterprise is targeting communities “that are actually interested in diverting waste from landfill” for testing and partnerships.  

Juno is also seeking outdoors the U.S. and Canada at the United Kingdom and Australia as prospective places of expansion. The technologies can be set up in a standalone facility or integrated into current facilities, Henriksson mentioned. 

“Ideally we want to find future Juno facilities close to the sources of waste so you lessen waste transportation,” he mentioned. “Juno plants could be positioned exactly where you really have transfer stations in cities.” 

Adding on to current transfer stations would also lessen disruption and enable haulers to preserve their very same routes and infrastructure, Henriksson added. 

“We can not wait to see this rolled out not just in the United States, but also globally,” he mentioned.  

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