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Clear skies. Low around 50F. Winds light and variable..
Clear skies. Low around 50F. Winds light and variable.
Justin Davis, general manager of Republic Services, talks to Rotary Club of Fort Wayne about the company’s environmental efforts.
Republic Services is going beyond trash services to finding ways to repurpose food waste and methane.
Justin Davis, general manager of Republic Services, talks to Rotary Club of Fort Wayne about the company’s environmental efforts.
Republic Services is going beyond trash services to finding ways to repurpose food waste and methane.
Last year Republic Services processed over 1 million tons of solid waste and recycling. In Fort Wayne it has hauling division, two landfills and a recycling facility. In Bryan, Ohio, it has another landfill and hauling operation.
However, Republic Services is going beyond just trash services with new initiatives in sustainability to reduce its customers’ carbon footprints.
The company, which employs 225 at its operations in Fort Wayne and Bryan is changing the way it markets itself.
“We are no longer a waste and recycling company,” said Justin Davis, general manager of Republic Services, to his fellow Rotary Club of Fort Wayne members May 9. “We are an environmental services company.”
Sustainability is at the core of its efforts, with major initiatives in Las Vegas and near San Diego.
Las Vegas is the land of endless buffets. “They had a food waste problem,” Davis said. “Food waste was overflowing their landfills.”
Food waste decomposes quickly, creating a liquid called leachate as well as methane gas. Methane is a major driver of climate change, Davis said, so Republic Services partnered with pig farms to use the separately processed food waste to feed their animals.
“We have now a circular economy where what was once food waste, was taking up landfill space, is now creating future food,” he said.
The effort daily keeps 25 tons of food waste out of landfills, resulting in food for 4,000 pigs.
Near San Diego it has a solar-powered composting facility that can process up to 140 tons of green waste that instead of going to landfills is turned into compost for agriculture applications.
“The facility uses reclaimed city water and is completely off the grid,” Davis said. “So not only is it not contributing to climate change and utility use through electricity, it is reducing green waste as well.”
In Fort Wayne, the company has a hauling division, two landfills and a recycling facility. It also has a biofuel gas-to-energy program. Today’s landfills are “highly engineered” construction sites made out of garbage, Davis said. Running through the waste stream are a number of pipelines with vacuum attachments that allows the company to collect the methane created in the decomposition process. The General Motors plant in Roanoke buys methane that’s mixed with natural gas to run the assembly plant’s electrical system.
Republic Services also collects the leachate and pumps the gray water to the city’s water treatment facility where the company pays for it to be treated.
Customers can help by doing three things, Davis said:
1. Know what to throw: cardboard, paper, metal cans and plastic bottles and jugs. Adding any other items to recyclables could contaminate them and require them to be disposed of or have to go through the sorting machines. “But the more residue we have, the more cost that’s associated with the recycling and the less material that ultimately makes it back into the circular economy.”
Republic Services is partnering with Brightmark, which has a plastics renewal facility in Ashley to process plastics that the Republic Services doesn’t have a current market for. Brightmark announced on Earth Day in April that since it opened in 2020 it has processed 4 million pounds of plastic waste such as food packaging, plastic bags, straws, boat wrap, coffee stirrers, styrofoam, coffee K-Cups, car seats and children’s toys. Brightmark says 91% of all plastic products does not get recycled.
Likewise, Republic Services will be opening a plastics polymer site in Las Vegas that will collect and convert plastic into virgin plastic. It can then create plastic bottles and sell them back to manufacturers.
2. Empty, clean and dry: Do a quick rinse of tip out the water before putting recyclables in the bin.
3. Don’t put recyclables in bags: The bags will need to be torn open and likely thrown away.
May 16: Mark Daniel, Fort Wayne Community Schools superintendent
May 23: Paul Harris Community Service Awards
May 30: No meeting in observance of Memorial Day
June 6: Mayor Julian Vonarb from Sister City Gera, Germany
June 13: Dan Starr, president & CEO of Do it Best Corp.
June 20: Peace committee/Peacemaker Academy
June 27: President Lynne Gilmore, Rotary year in review
Meeting are held noon-1 p.m. Mondays in the Suite-Level Lounge at Parkview Field, 1301 Ewing St. Lunch is available for $11.
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