The nation that buys most of San Diego’s recycled bottles, cans and paper is now buying less.
China’s strict new regulations for the purchase of foreign recycled material is causing a recycling glut in the city of San Diego.
That surplus is costing local taxpayers millions of dollars.
In fiscal year 2017, the city made $4 million from its curbside recycling contract with IMS Recycling Services and the Allen Company. In fiscal year 2018, revenue dropped, but the city treasury still netted $3 million from the program.
But the city’s Environmental Services Department now predicts that China’s restrictive policies will cause the city to lose at least another $1.5 million in the current fiscal year.
Ken Prue III, the city’s recycling program manager, told NBC 7 that the program might, in fact, generate no income this fiscal year.
“Best case, we’ll get $1.5 million, but most probably, nothing,” Prue said.
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China has adopted strict standards for its purchase of recycled products. Prue said that the Asian nation no longer accepts mixed paper or mixed plastics and is closely inspecting U.S. shipments of cardboard and other items it does take, to ensure those items meet strict new standards for cleanliness.
“And when they turned off the tap, (we) had to find a new home for that material,” Prue said.
Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia and other countries also buy our recycled items, but Prue said those markets lack the capacity of a huge, industrialized country like China.
It's also gotten more expensive to process our recycling because the companies that handle that chore must hire more workers and slow down their sorting lines to make sure no dirty material gets through.
Prue said the city’s business partners are always looking for new markets for our recycling, and are now focused on domestic uses for the material.
“Ultimately it would be best if we had more domestic infrastructure that could take it,” Prue said. “Paper mills and mills that could process the plastic. Things like that."
Until that happens, Prue said San Diego residents can help relieve the recycling glut by paying close attention to what they put in their blue bins.
Prue said customer should never put plastic bags filled with recycling directly in the blue bins. Take the newspapers, bottles, cans, and other items out of the bags, before you put that material in the bins.
Don’t put empty plastic bags, garden hoses, cords or other non-recyclable items in the blue bins.
And never assume the city will find a way to recycle items that are not on the approved list.
"People think, ‘Well, it's not really the cardboard or the paper or the bottles or cans or the plastic items that I'm supposed to put in the bin. But you know what, if I put it in there, they'll find a way to [use it].’ We ask people not to do that."
