The program aims to recycle plastic protective covers used for boats.

New Jersey-based Valhalla Boatworks has become the most recent addition to the list of boat manufacturers currently recycling plastic protective covers through the Yamaha Rightwaters plastics recycling program. To date, the program, which launched in August 2021, is responsible for returning 17,911 pounds of polyethylene and polypropylene sheet plastics back into base materials, reducing the amount of plastics in U.S. waterways.

Created, owned and operated by the Viking Yacht Company, Valhalla Boatworks offers four center consoles from 33 to 55 feet.

“Yamaha Rightwaters, through initiatives such as the plastic recycling program, continues to create opportunities for marine sustainability and conservation. Valhalla Boatworks is enthusiastic about being part of the journey,” says John Leek IV, general manager of Viking Mullica. “By participating in this program, it’s our hope that we can help significantly reduce plastic in the nation’s waters.”

The Yamaha Rightwaters plastics recycling program leverages a reverse logistics strategy to return the protective covers from select boat builders, retail dealers and its three boat production facilities. Additional contributing manufacturers include Contender Boats, Regulator Marine, Xpress Boats, Yamaha Jet Boat Manufacturing, Skeeter, and G3 Boats.

The materials ship from participating boat builders and dealers to Marietta, Georgia-based Tommy Nobis Enterprises, which separates recyclable plastics from other materials, such as plastic zippers, cords and eyelets. Tommy Nobis Enterprises then ships the feedstock to Atlanta, Georgia-based end-to-end plastics recycling business Nexus for processing into raw materials, which range from gasses to waxes. Those materials are then used for other products.

The NextCycle program selects new and expanding businesses and organizations through a competitive application process and connects them to resources and expertise.

NextCycle Colorado, a program designed to boost manufacturing solutions for recycled or recovered content in Colorado, will host a pitch competition Wednesday, June 22, from 5 to 8 p.m. at eTown Hall in Boulder. During the competition, businesses seeking to connect with private investors will pitch ideas. 

The competition is the culmination of NextCycle Colorado programming, which pursues creative ideas to improve recycling and composting end markets. This year’s event will showcase nine teams that spent the last four months receiving mentorship from industry leaders and subject matter experts as well as technical support from Resource Recycling Systems (RRS), a consultancy based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. 

“This is an exciting time for recycling in Colorado, as we’re putting progressive efforts in motion that have the potential to really move the needle and improve recycling rates statewide,” says Jill Hunsaker Ryan, executive director of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE). “NextCycle has helped foster important innovations from local businesses, and I look forward to the creative solutions these latest teams bring to Colorado.”

“By investing time and resources into the teams, NextCycle Colorado creates stronger recycling businesses for the state,” says Kendra Appelman-Eastvedt, recycling grants supervisor at CDPHE. “These businesses will create new jobs, products and services and, most importantly, continue the momentum toward our goal of recycling more in Colorado.”

The NextCycle program selects new and expanding businesses and organizations through a competitive application process and connects them to resources and expertise. NextCycle teams have been awarded more than $1.5 million in Recycling Resources Economic Opportunity program grants from CDPHE since the program’s inception in 2018. 

Nine teams will be showcased in the 2022 pitch competition: 

“Colorado NextCycle supports businesses and organizations at every level,” says Juri Freeman, managing principal at RRS. “The state has immense entrepreneurial talent, and the Pitch Competition is the opportunity to elevate the teams and take their businesses to the next level.”

Bolstering NextCycle’s efforts is a new law approved earlier this month that will create Colorado’s first Circular Economy Development Center, which aims to empower Colorado businesses to create products using materials that Coloradans recycle. The center will help CDPHE achieve its commitment to increasing how much residents are recycling across the state.

The Colorado NextCycle pitch competition is free and open to the public. Investors, funders, business and community leaders, media and anyone interested are invited to attend. 

Please visit Colorado NextCycle Pitch Competition for more information or to register to attend.

Funding for Colorado NextCycle is provided through the Recycling Resources Economic Opportunity program. 

The online program will feature six courses focused on paper and fibers recycling.

The Remade Institute, a 148-member public-private partnership established by the United States Department of Energy with an initial investment of $140 million, has announced a new training boot camp to accelerate the nation’s transition to a circular economy.

The live, two-day, online boot camp in advanced fibers recycling – part of the Institute’s Remade Academy – will take place from 11 a.m.to 4:30 p.m, Tuesday, June 21 and from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Wednesday, June 22. The training, which focuses on paper recycling, encompasses six courses and leads to an awareness-level certificate.

Remade CEO Nabil Nasr says the upcoming recycling boot camp is part of Remade’s ongoing efforts to train workers across the United States in next-generation technologies. Remade training enables the U.S.’s transition to a circular economy which reduces energy consumption; decreases greenhouse gas emissions; reduces the use of raw and virgin, or primary, materials; and increases the supply and use of recycled, or secondary, materials. Additional benefits of a circular approach include an increase in manufacturing competitiveness, an increase in supply chain resiliency and a decrease in dependence on raw materials from outside the U.S.

“For U.S. manufacturing to stay competitive and have ready access to a resilient supply chain, manufacturers nationwide must accelerate their transition to a circular economy, and their workers must be trained in next-generation, circular technologies,” Nasr says.

Fibers recycling, including paper recycling, is critically important in the U.S. and around the world, Remade says. In the U.S.’ current curbside recycling system, paper and cardboard are frequently contaminated, resulting in more than 17.2 million tons, or 25 percent, or municipal solid waste paper and paperboard ending up in a landfill, according to Remade. Through the Institute’s ongoing research, Remake seeks to remove contaminants, increase recycling rates, and as a result, increase the supply of recycled papers to manufacturers in the U.S.

The boot camp’s six courses are led by Kecheng Li, Ph.D., professor and chair of the department of chemical and paper engineering at Western Michigan University (WMU), and are taught by professors and experts with WMU, Resource Recycling Systems and other organizations. Courses featured in the boot camp are:

The boot camp is open to all. Innovators, researchers and leaders in industry, academia, government and the nonprofit sector who are interested in learning more about the U.S.’s transition to a circular economy, especially in the areas of paper recycling and fibers recycling, are especially encouraged to attend. A certificate of completion will be issued to participants upon successful passage of a quiz to validate course attendance.

Registration information for the awareness-level bootcamp can be found here. Cost is free for Remade members and is $1,300 for nonmembers. Additional fibers recycling courses at both the practitioner level and expert level will be available to Institute members only on-demand.

Through its Remade Academy, the Institute offers members more than 50 hours of online training content focused on systems analysis, design, materials optimization, remanufacturing and end-of-life and recycling and recovery of four energy-intensive material classes: metals, plastics/polymers, fibers and electronic waste.

In addition, for the first time, Remade is also offering select short courses and certificate courses to non-members for a fee. Besides the upcoming boot camp, select courses available to nonmembers include:

The packaging producer has expanded its northbox line and installed an automated packaging line at its new facility in York, Pennsylvania.

Cascades Inc., a Kingsey Falls, Quebec-based packaging producer, continues to expand into the isothermal packaging market with advanced technology added to its Northbox line of meal boxes and has commissioned a new production facility in York, Pennsylvania.

The company has added its Northbox Xtend technology to its meal boxes, creating a moisture barrier that helps keep the insulation rigid. Cascades says the technology allows the boxes to keep food fresh during long transit times and in regions with higher temperatures, requiring less ice. The boxes also are made with recycled cardboard and determined to be recyclable by an external laboratory and prequalified by How2Recycle—a standardized labeling system in both the United States and Canada.

"We're pleased to innovate with our customers to offer them a variety of high-performance and adaptable isothermal packaging solutions," says Luc Langevin, president and chief operating officer of Cascades' specialty products group. "Since 2007, our recycled cardboard meal boxes have been perfected to meet operational and environmental challenges. Our expansion plan in the market is rolling out as anticipated, reinforcing our role as strategic partner that works in close proximity with customers."

Cascades new production site in York is the company's second in four months after the opening of a facility in Tacoma, Washington, in February. The company says it expanded its presence in the East to get closer to customers and strengthen its position as a strategic partner throughout North America.

The first phase of the expansion includes the installation of what Cascades calls a "state-of-the-art," highly automated packaging line for the production of its isothermal boxes. It installed similar technology at its Tacoma plant and said at the time of the announcement that the new sites allow it to increase production capacity and expand geographic coverage.

UPM Specialty Papers and Smithers consider sustainability trends for food packaging.

Many consumers expect food packaging to be recyclable, compostable or biodegradable, including food packaging today. According to a recent study from Helsinki-based UPM Specialty Papers and Akron, Ohio-based Smithers, this expectation of sustainable food packaging among consumers is expected to increase over the next 20 years.

UPM Specialty Papers and Smithers released a white paper titled, “Sustainable Food Packaging in 2040,” which provides a forecast for what sustainable food packaging might look like in 2040. The companies surveyed more than 200 senior packaging professionals across the globe and from throughout the packaging value chain to consider the likelihood and impact of key changes in food packaging.

The following are four key trends UPM Specialty Papers and Smithers highlight in the white paper.

By 2040, consumers will not tolerate a choice between sustainability and convenience—they will expect both.

Brands and retailers have experienced much disruption in the last two decades with an accelerating channel shift to e-commerce as well as the growing pressure to be more sustainable. As a result, brands will need packaging solutions that provide good end-of-life options without compromising convenience and performance.

“E-commerce is such a rapidly growing area that we as brand owners should consistently think about the ways to reduce the packaging waste for our consumers,” says Grace Kim, head of global packaging R&D at CJ CheilJedang in South Korea, adding that Amazon’s Frustration-Free Packaging is one example of how a company is providing a sustainable packaging solution as well as a better consumer experience.

By 2040, sustainability will be a government mandate.

Sustainability isn’t just a concern for consumers—governments and nongovernmental organizations have placed emphasis on achieving sustainability. Survey respondents reported that they expect to see an increase in regulatory control of packaging over the next two decades to improve environmental outcomes. Some expect to see more extended producer responsibility initiatives, recycling targets and packaging material bans.

Kim of CJ CheilJedang says Korea currently has mandated recycling fees for the use of plastic by brand owners. She says, “We are expecting that there will be many more regulations coming our way in next couple of years.”

By 2040, recycling, reuse and composting will increase, but about 21 percent of food packaging will still be sent to landfill.

Today, recycling rates vary from material to material and region to region, but members across the packaging value chain are working together to find ways to increase recycling rates for packaging materials.

However, respondents expressed concern about the lack of sufficient recycling infrastructure to improve recycling rates.

“Even if consumer behavior changes and we achieve a higher recycling rate, and even if the brand owners come up with the great technologies, if the recyclable packaging isn’t collected and sorted right, it won’t go back to the beginning of the life cycle,” Kim says.

Respondents also reported that they are concerned that there will not be sufficient investment to address the recycling gap.

Although survey respondents reported that they expect landfill and incineration to remain an end-of-life option for some packaging materials in 2040, there is optimism that recycling rates will improve, decreasing the rate of these materials going to the landfill. Recycling rates for fiber-based packaging are high. Also, trends related to increasing government mandates and wider acceptance of food-safe recovered fiber packaging will help boost recycling rates for food packaging.

By 2040, fiber-based packaging will be perceived as a very sustainable packaging choice.

In 2021, nearly half of all packaging materials are polymer-based, representing 40 percent of the global market by value. But as consumer sentiment against plastics increases and some brands are seeking to reduce their use of plastic packaging, survey respondents reported to UPM Specialty Papers and Smithers that they expect to see fiber-based packaging rise as a food packaging option.

In order for fiber-based packaging to increase as an option, progress must be made to packaging innovations, such as finding packaging solutions that enable fiber-based packaging to improve barrier performance without compromising recyclability as well as overall strength performance.

“The role of coatings in enabling the use of fiber-based packaging in different roles will be important, particularly to enhance salability and permeability. However, the coatings would have to be easily removed in recycling and/or compostable,” says Alistair Irvine, senior manager of food contact testing at Smithers, who is based in the United Kingdom.

Some technologies, such as blockchain and smart packaging, also will enable a more traceable and cohesive recycling system for fiber-based packaging.

The complete white paper is available to download online.