Treating government Schizophrenia.

On page 16 of this issue we discuss issues and challenges facing the demolition industry with the Executive Committee of the National Demolition Association. These leading demolition contractors say disposing of materials generated by demolition activity is the biggest issue they face, whether because of recycling mandates/LEED requirements or travel distance and trucking costs to landfills. Granted, a lot of this is just the cost of doing business and the nature of the beast, but there are external factors that exacerbate the problem.

Leonard Cherry of Cherry Demolition, Houston, says: "We get the state legislatures--through strong lobbying efforts from the natural aggregate or landfill concerns--that are attempting by legislation and regulation to limit the recycling opportunities. Then we get the bureaucrats pushing from the opposite direction wanting to enforce additional recycling. Consequently, you find the recyclers and the demolition contractors stuck in the middle--getting squeezed by the legislation on one hand and the bureaucrats on the other."

What Cherry means is that many government entities, and commercial customers as well, now require or expect C&D recycling to take place on their projects. Yet in many parts of the country barriers to recycling remain, barriers often erected by governmental agencies at the urging of those businesses with the most to lose from C&D recycling. It reminds me of an analogy once told to me by a hot-mix asphalt plant operator, about how on one end of his process he had governmental agencies stuffing all the recyclable wastes they could into his plant, while at the other end an environmental enforcement official is waiting to write up as many citations as possible for bad emissions.

It's the same for those trying to recycle C&D materials. Demolition contractors will do it, as long as it makes money and they have a market for the material, or at least a facility at which to drop it off. But sometimes, ludicrous regulations make setting up the means to recycle difficult.

One recent example is the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency's definition of recycling. Any C&D material made into alternative daily cover or into burn fuel is not considered to be recycled, which pretty much wipes out the basic markets for mixed C&D recyclers. It also makes any company wanting to set up a C&D recycling plant nearly anywhere in the state have to get a solid waste permit. In light of some recent efforts of some companies to get a solid waste permit for a transfer station in the Chicago suburbs (and failing to do so even after spending as much as $1 million to try, to get regulatory, approval), it is no wonder that mixed C&D recycling is so stymied in the Land of Lincoln.

There are numerous examples like this. For their part, recycling market development officials dismiss these obstacles, or don't recognize them as problems. But if they want to see more recycling, then they have to work with their brethren on the regulatory, side to allow the development of safe C&D regulations, and not allow so many barriers to be erected by senseless regulation.

If you haven't already registered, keep in mind the 2005 CMRA Annual Meeting is rapidly approaching. It takes place March 16 (in coordination with ConExpo-ConAgg) at the Treasure Island Hotel in Las Vegas. Please contact the CMRA at [phone]; [e-mail].