Newest quotas from China accept larger volumes of world’s scrap material

Newest quotas from China accept larger volumes
Although the most recent batch of quotas neared 1 million metric tons, China’s government still intends to keep most scrap out of the country in 2021.

By Brian Taylor, Recycling Today

The 12th 2020 batch of imported scrap quotas issued by the Solid Waste & Chemicals Management Centre of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment of the People’s Republic of China will let in a relatively generous amount of material compared with some previous ones.

The 12th batch, announced Sept. 17, allows more than 730,000 metric tons of recovered fiber to enter through Chinese ports, plus more than 135,000 metric tons of red metal scrap, more than 120,000 metric tons of aluminum scrap, and just 2,600 metric tons of ferrous scrap.

China’s economy is farther along a post-COVID-19 rebound curve compared with most other nations, and its government has targeted infrastructure spending as a major components of its economic stimulus efforts.

The second-half 2020 rebound, combined with the strict quota system for scrap in China, has put a strain on raw material supplies there. One symptom has been a boost in the importation of semi-finished and finished metals in a nation that more often is considered an exporter of such materials.

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The most recent batch of quotas with its higher numbers is similar to the ninth batch, issued in early July, which saw some 200,000 metric tons of aluminum scrap welcomed in as the nation prepared for its economic rebound. The 10th and 11th batches, however, together only letting in about 3,700 metric tons of aluminum scrap.

The nation’s government, led by its Ministry of Ecology and the Environment (MEE), has been attempting to lead China’s basic materials producers away from imported scrap. Plastic scrap has largely been banned, while recovered fiber will be severely restricted if not banned in 2021. Metals producers in China appear to have had some success in getting higher grades of scrap metal declared as “resources” allowed to be imported, although that system has not been finalized.

China’s seemingly protectionist stance toward imported scrap has been identified by the Washington-based Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) as a set of actions that are in violation of the country’s World Trade Organization (WTO) obligations.

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On her way out the door, NY sanitation commissioner warns against ‘devastating’ budget cuts

Office of Bill de Blasio
After six years on the job, Kathryn Garcia is considering a mayoral run. In an exit interview, she discourages layoffs, updates waste zone timing and says “zero waste” by 2030 is likely unattainable.

By Cole Rosengren, Waste Dive

New York Department of Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia is stepping down as the city continues to work through many pandemic challenges at a potential inflection point in its waste history.

Since being appointed to run the nation’s largest sanitation department (DSNY) in March 2014, managing approximately 10,000 employees, Garcia said she has worked to ensure “a lot of pieces of different puzzles really came together” for city waste infrastructure. This included overseeing the construction of delayed marine transfer stations, signing major disposal contracts, supporting the passage of long-debated legislation, making internal systems paperless, launching a procurement program to support businesses owned by people of color and women, and more.

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But she has also seen setbacks in her tenure, with progress toward a 2030 “zero waste” goal hard to achieve in recent years and what was once the nation’s largest curbside organics collection program frozen amid $106 million in budget cuts. A major plan to reshape the city’s commercial waste sector has also been delayed multiple times due to the pandemic’s economic disruptions. Now, the threat of even more cuts is looming in the months ahead.

Garcia tendered her resignation to term-limited Mayor Bill de Blasio last week, calling cuts and layoffs at the agency so far “unconscionable,” according to multiple reports. Now, she may run for mayor in 2021 and would draw on a long resume at multiple city agencies, beginning with her days as a DSNY intern. 

Waste Dive recently spoke with the commissioner ahead of her final week on the job.

The following interview has been edited for brevity.

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New Jersey signs landmark environmental justice bill into law

By Alexandra Kelley, The HIll, Sept. 18, 2020

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy (D) signed a stalled environmental justice bill into law on Friday that aims to halt the development of new pollution centers like sewage treatment plants, landfills, transfer stations, scrap metal facilities and medical waste incinerators in low-income communities, Reuters reports.

The move comes amid a push for environmental justice that affects communities of color as new data emerges showing historically marginalized populations, such as Black and Hispanic Americans, living in areas with higher concentrations of pollution.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with Black and Hispanic Americans facing higher death and hospitalization rates than their white counterparts, scientific literature has focused on how the exposure to more air pollutants worsens that outcome for a severe illness. 

Speaking with reporters, Mustafa Santiago Ali, a former Environmental Protection Agency\ official in the Obama administration, said that low-income neighborhoods with large immigrant and minority communities are subject to zoning practices that allow high-polluting industries to establish business nearby. Decades of socioeconomic redlining has forced people of color into less desirable living areas with higher volumes of pollution.

“Folks don’t by accident end up in these communities,” Ali said. “We have traditionally pushed people into certain areas, or we’ve chosen those areas that we don’t place a lot of value on to put certain things.”

Per a press release issued by Murphy’s office, the bill will monitor the permit requests of “certain facilities on overburdened communities.”

An overburdened community, in this case, is defined as any community where 35 percent of the households qualify as low-income per the U.S. Census, 40 percent of households are minority-owned, or 40 percent of the households in the community have limited English proficiency. 

In New Jersey alone, there are reportedly 310 municipalities that could qualify. 

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Related News Stories:
Landmark law to protect N.J.’s poorest communities from pollution signed by Murphy (NJ.com)
New Jersey legislature passes landmark environmental justice bill with big permit implications (Waste Dive)
NJ suing to get justice for polluted, low-income towns (NJ..com)
New Jersey Passes Landmark Environmental Justice Legislation (National Law Review)

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Trump’s climate change rollbacks to drive up U.S. emissions

The cumulative additional amount of greenhouse gases would exceed the current annual output of Russia, the world’s fourth-biggest carbon polluter.

Emissions spew out of a large stack.
President Donald Trump has taken the U.S. in the opposite direction, pressing for increasing oil, natural gas and coal output. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images

By ZACK COLMAN and ALEX GUILLÉN, Politico

President Donald Trump’s rollback of Obama-era climate regulations will cause the United States to pump an extra 1.8 billion tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere between now and 2035, at a time when scientists say the world needs to slash its carbon pollution dramatically to avoid catastrophe, researchers said Thursday.

The forecast from the climate research firm Rhodium Group is one of the most detailed and comprehensive estimates to date of how Trump’s regulatory U-turn will affect the amount of planet-warming carbon dioxide coming from tailpipes, leaking oil and gas wells, power plants and refrigerants. It concludes that if Trump’s rollbacks remain in place, U.S. climate pollution 15 years from now will be 3 percent higher than current projections indicate.

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What’s next for NJ’s sweeping plastic bag ban?

Bill gets a vote, but it calls for eliminating paper bags and more. Even supporters say they might back away

Approval by a key Assembly committee Thursday was seen as a victory by environmental advocates, but it might be short-lived.

Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight

A key committee approved a bill to ban single-use carryout plastic and paper bags, as well as other plastics, but now even some of its supporters acknowledged their backing could end without major changes in the legislation.

The measure, a top legislative priority of most New Jersey environmental organizations for the past few years, won approval Thursday from the Assembly Appropriations Committee — seen as a victory by environmental advocates who have pushed for the legislation for the past few years.

The victory might be short-lived, however,  given that there seemed to be widespread opposition from both Republicans and Democrats over a provision in the bill to ban single-use paper bags, as well as polystyrene-foam food containers.

The legislation (A-1978) was amended and merged with a Senate version (S-864), a step that means, if approved by the full Assembly, it needs to go back to the Senate for concurrence.

Bill not in the bag

Proponents seemed to recognize there is still a lot of work to do.

“It’s the strongest bill in the country, but it’s not going to happen overnight,’’ said Doug O’Malley, director of Environment New Jersey. “It’s a big step forward, but there’s a lot of work to do.’’

The legislation initially was vehemently opposed by many business interests, but the wide support for banning single-use plastic bags both nationwide and among many communities had diminished some opposition partly due to the proliferation of cities and towns adopting their own, often different, kinds of bans. Businesses prefer a single statewide law, rather than a mishmash of different local laws.

From foe to friend of bill

The New Jersey Food Council, a foe of earlier versions of the bill, now backs a total ban on both single-use plastic and paper bags, said Linda Doherty, president and CEO, although the group won a small technical amendment by the committee. The amendment is expected to be adopted, a change that will mean the bill, if approved by the Assembly will have to go back to the Senate for concurrence.

In New Jersey, more than 130 municipalities have adopted bans, according to Jennifer Coffey, executive director of the Association of New Jersey Environmental Commissions. At least eight states, beginning with California in 2014, have adopted statewide bans, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

“We think this is the right move at the right time,’’ Coffey said, “It demonstrates people understand this issue and they want action from their legislators.’’

Besides banning single-use carryout plastic and paper bags, the bill also would ban polystyrene foam food-service products and limit the use of single-use plastic straws.

Paper ban draws critics

The ban on single-use paper bags, the first such prohibition in the country, stirred the most opposition in committee, followed by the ban on polystyrene foam food-service containers.

“Paper bags don’t belong in this bill,’’ said Matt Wells, a senior regional manager at Westrock Co., a manufacturer of paper and packaging products, who called the ban a fundamentally flawed public policy.

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Vermont House Votes to Override Veto of Climate Bill

House Speaker Mitzi Johnson (D-South Hero)

By Kevin McCallum, Seven Days

After hearing impassioned testimony from its members, the Vermont House voted Thursday to override Gov. Phil Scott’s veto of the Global Warming Solutions Act.

The final tally was 103-47, surpassing the 100 votes needed for a veto override in the House. The Senate is virtually assured to do the same in the coming days, meaning the bill, H.688, will soon become the law of the land.
“A vision without a plan is a hallucination,” Rep. Tim Briglin (D-Thetford), a bill sponsor and chair of the House Energy and Technology Committee, said after the vote. “H.688 moves us from aspiration to accountability.”

Critics of the bill recounted a litany of objections that they and the governor have expressed about it. Chief among them is a provision that gives residents the right to sue if the state misses its emissions targets.

Vermont has pledged to reduce emissions to 26 percent below 2005 levels by 2025; 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030; and 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. It is not on track to meet the 2025 goal.

Vermont is the only state in New England with higher emissions than it had 30 years ago.

Rep. Mark Higley (R-Lowell) noted that Massachusetts got sued by groups with “deep pockets” for failing to meet its emissions goals, and he worried the bill would invite the same result here.

“This isn’t just a fantasy,” Higley said. “This is something that could — and I believe will — happen.”

House Minority Leader Pattie McCoy (R-Poultney) read an email from Agency of Natural Resources Secretary Julie Moore that warned the bill “sets the state up to fail.”

Moore wrote that when that happens, “the only solutions will be litigation, delay and ultimately actions which rely heavily on potentially costly regulatory tools.”

McCoy said the bill’s creation of a 23-member Vermont Climate Council, which would be tasked with creating an emissions reduction plan, “usurps my authority” as a legislator.

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