CMRA takes advocacy actions.* The Construction Materials Recycling recycling, the process of recovering and reusing waste products—from household use, manufacturing, agriculture, and business—and thereby reducing their burden on the environment. Association (CMRA CMRA Commercial Mail Receiving Agency CMRA Construction Materials Recycling Association CMRA Central Motorcycle Roadracing Association CMRA Capital Market Risk Advisors, Inc. ), mostly through its Issues & Education Fund, has undertaken several advocacy actions on behalf of the C&D recycling industry. The first involves the association's Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, Chapter. Members there sought to solve the problem of municipalities throughout the state with conflicting mandates. Many solid waste districts mandate that when roads and bridges are demolished de·mol·ish tr.v. de·mol·ished, de·mol·ish·ing, de·mol·ish·es 1. To tear down completely; raze. 2. To do away with completely; put an end to. 3. , the material has to be taken to recycling centers, but some of those same municipalities won't purchase the recyclers' finished aggregate product for their road projects. The reason the municipalities demand that the material be sent to recycling centers is California's Assembly Bill 939, legislation that requires all cities and towns in the state to recycle re·cy·cle tr.v. re·cy·cled, re·cy·cling, re·cy·cles 1. To put or pass through a cycle again, as for further treatment. 2. To start a different cycle in. 3. a. or reuse reuse - Using code developed for one application program in another application. Traditionally achieved using program libraries. Object-oriented programming offers reusability of code via its techniques of inheritance and genericity. at least a 50 percent of the waste they generate. Since communities can be fined for not reaching the 50 percent goal, they need the diversion credit to avoid the penalties. But a main task of state and local governments is building and maintaining roads. In California, CalTrans, the state's department of transportation, has long recognized the value of recycled concrete and asphalt asphalt (ăs`fôlt, –fălt), brownish-black substance used commonly in road making, roofing, and waterproofing. Chemically, it is a natural mixture of hydrocarbons. , and even has a specification for recycled concrete as a road base product in its main specifications book. Most of California's highways are built on recycled concrete road base. Despite this support from CalTrans, some municipalities do not use recycled road base in their own projects. However, the CalTrans experience with its state highways shows that if the material is made to meet the specification, recycled concrete road base meet all engineering criteria and performance needs. It also saves money. A document prepared by CMRA member Dan Copp of Dan Copp Crushing, Anaheim, Calif., shows that when all costs are factored, the use of recycled base by government entities saves taxpayers money because of lower transportation costs. Currently, natural aggregate is hard to obtain in parts of Southern California. It demands a premium price and sometimes has to be trucked great distances. Concrete recycling When structures made of concrete are to be demolished, concrete recycling is an increasingly common method of disposing of the rubble. Concrete debris was once routinely shipped to landfills for disposal, but recycling has a number of benefits that have made it a more attractive yards are usually a lot closer to the road projects. Not only is there the cost advantage, this means trucks are not on the area's clogged roadways as much, and there is less air pollution caused by the trucks. CMRA members met with several personnel of the California Integrated Waste Management Board about the situation. From these meetings a couple of plans of action were developed. First, there is a California state law requiring municipalities to specify both virgin and recycled products when putting out requests for bids for the products they buy. There are 12 categories of products this applies to, but construction and demolition materials are not specifically named as being part of those products. It is expected that CMRA will advocate the legislative branch fix this oversight and include recycled C&D products as part of the mandate on bid specifications. There are also plans for an education program. Actions are being made to present information at two League of California Cities conferences, one for public works public works pl.n. Construction projects, such as highways or dams, financed by public funds and constructed by a government for the benefit or use of the general public. Noun 1. directors and the association's annual meeting. In the country's far northeast, the CMRA has joined forces with the waste industry's associations to oppose a planned rail haul facility in Wilmington, Mass., that will handle C&D and other materials. The CMRA and several of its members are contributing to the effort to slow or stop the planned facility, saying it is transfer station masquerading 1. (networking) masquerading - "NAT" (Linux kernel name). 2. (messaging) masquerading - Hiding the names of internal e-mail client and gateway machines from the outside world by rewriting the "From" address and other headers as the message leaves the as a railroad operation. For more information about these projects, the CMRA can be contacted at (630) 5857530 or info@cdrecycling.org. |
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