Recycling in Minnesota

I almost always appreciate the Curious Minnesota column that runs in the Sunday Star Tribune. The questions are historical about half the time, but the rest are random asks about why something is the way it is. I often know the answer to those generally since I've lived here forever, but I almost always learn more of the details and background story.

Last Sunday's was called What is made from our recycled waste? 

I know that a lot of people are suspicious that the stuff they put in their recycling bins ends up in a landfill or gets incinerated, but as a more informed zero-waste advocate, I know a bit about where this material goes, at least in Saint Paul, and that's not true.

Minnesota has a law that says if something is collected as recycling, it can't go into a landfill. A "residual rate" is allowed because all too many people do what is called "wish-cycling," where they add things to recycling bins that are not recyclable. So of course those have to be disposed of. But all recyclables must be recycled in Minnesota. If there is no market, they are held until there is a market. If there continues to be no market, they stop collecting that item, as Saint Paul has with Number 4 plastic, for instance. 

Despite my usual know-it-all ways, the article had some facts that were news to me:

• Saint Paul's recycler, Eureka, sends 80% of the material it collects to Minnesota-based companies.
• Most of their paper goes to WestRock, not far from me in Saint Paul, to become cereal and cracker boxes. (I did know that. Neighborhood newsies know that WestRock even came up with a cool process to deal with the grease on pizza boxes.) A Moorhead company makes egg cartons out of newsprint. 
• Plastic bags (which you have to drop off specially: they can't go into household recycling) are truly recycled, getting made back into plastic bags. That doesn't happen in Minnesota yet, but it will by next year when a new plant opens on the exurban edge of the Twin Cities.
• All of the glass stays in Saint Paul at a company called Strategic Materials. The Strib story has a cool detailed description of how the sorting process works. Strategic turns the glass into small pieces and ground mixtures, then sends it off to bottle-making companies (like Anchor Glass in Shakopee, pictured) or fiberglass manufacturers.

 

Star Tribune photo by Brian Peterson