A scrap buyer shares the issues that are affecting his mills and offers some suggestions for working with scrap dealers to address some of these factors.
Speaking during the Spotlight on Copper session at the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) 2022 Convention & Exposition this March in Las Vegas, Trent Poland of Kymera International offered the scrap dealers in attendance a view into the business disruptions affecting the daily operations of a scrap consumer. “I am sharing my experience inside my company. I cannot authoritatively speak about the entire copper scrap consuming segment,” he said, “but I can give you some data points that I believe are common issues.”
Poland is commodity manager for North Carolina-based Kymera International, a specialty materials company focused on nonferrous powders, granules and pastes, including aluminum, copper, tin, tantalum, titanium and their alloys, as well as vanadium, niobium and molybdenum master alloys. Kymera sells its products into the aerospace, medical, electronics, chemical, specialty auto markets. Kymera International has manufacturing facilities in the U.S., Australia, Europe and Asia. Poland, who is based in Tennessee, buys scrap for six of Kymera’s facilities, though the company has 12 locations worldwide.
The issues affecting Kymera’s operations are macroeconomic and “and generally beyond our control,” Poland said, as well as microeconomic and can be controlled to some extent.
“Even in the best of times, demand forecasting is a bit like playing the Wheel of Fortune,” Poland said, explaining how “way back in the normal times, our customers’ offtake was largely predictable, and this wasn't a very large problem.” However, since the pandemic, customers’ offtake “moves in jerks, stops and odd accelerations.”
Plant management tries to match facility output to the sales forecasts, Poland said, “but unexplained mechanical failures do occur. And now supply chain disruptions send us scrambling to find spares. We often have to wait for a backorder to clear or throw an engineer at a problem. What once was a 15-minute fix is now a five-day headache.”
Short staffing has “sent production planning into triage mode,” Poland added.
Scrap delivery appointment requests can be delayed “as we are often waiting for the other departments to publish their forecasts,” he said, adding that wild swings in delivery appointments are common. “Recently I literally started a Monday with a three-week backlog for delivery appointments, and, by Wednesday, I was asking folks if they could get me a load that Friday morning.”
Poland suggested that recyclers let their mill customers or their brokers know if they have loads ready to ship even if their appointments are a week out. “That way, if the plant starts yelling for material, we know who to call first.
“For mills, the chaos of trying to predict what we will need when is compounded if the planned deliveries miss their appointments,” Poland continued.
He recommended that scrap dealers ensure their loads are ready to go for their appointments. “Trucks are hard enough to find these days without shooting ourselves in the foot by not having the material ready to ship.”
While Poland said mills normally address disrupted supply chains by carrying more inventory, with metals prices at all-time highs, finance departments are discouraging this. “Paradoxically, we are having to trim our raw materials inventory at the worst possible time,” he said.
“My advice to you is, again, hit your delivery appointments,” Poland said. “Because if one of my plants falls out of production, inventory starts to swell and then finance starts sweating. If you miss a delivery appointment, you have just volunteered to help fix my problems.”
Poland also said his company is seeing a “record amount” of yards that are late for their deliveries, adding that many sellers appear to be overestimating the flow of scrap across their scales. “And as we rocketed to new COMEX highs, shippers locked in loads. I might suggest that one be triply careful about overselling their position,” he said, noting that he too has “gotten burned on the opposite direction.”
Poland added, “Let an extra measure of caution rule the day.”
He noted a decline in the quality of scrap in the first few months of the year, noting that mills are making “too much slag, baghouse dust and rework.” Poland attributed the declining scrap quality to the labor shortage, but he reminded scrap processors that downgrades and rejects eventually will result.
“My recommendation would be to increase your quality checks,” he advised. “Do an extra check before loading the truck to the mill and increase your spot checks behind your new inexperienced sorters.”
Short loads also have been an issue, with Poland noting that truckloads of scrap, which normally averaged between net 42,000 pounds and 42,500 pounds, are arriving net 39,000 pounds and even as light as net 34,000 pounds. “Our current average is now less than 41,000 pounds per truck,” he said. “This is putting the consumer at market risk, the very thing that we want to avoid given the recent large moves in COMEX. At some point, one has to buy an additional load, just to make up for all those small shortages.”
Poland suggested that scrap dealers avoid shipping short loads without getting the mill’s OK first, saying “it is exasperating on our end when we receive a 36,000-pound load while the plant is not in full production, as we could have easily waited a week or two and gotten the full load instead.”
With daily “scrap-induced ulcers,” Poland said creative problem solving and conflict resolution “are the skills that are going to get us all through this.”
He said personal relationships always have been an important and unique facet to scrap transactions. “To me, that is the fundamental key of getting past these challenges. Because when things go wrong, and they inevitably will, we have to work it out with our creative problem solving and conflict resolution skills. And we do that with people that we have solid business relationships with. That way, we can hammer out a solution that we can both live with. And we survive to scrap another day.”
Decluttering firm that stresses landfill diversion receives funding from a real estate-affiliated venture capitalist.
San Francisco-based Remoov, which describes itself as a decluttering and reselling service, says it has received $2.4 million in new funding from a venture capital firm founded by “a real estate mogul with a passion for social change [who] supports the decluttering startup’s drive to increase charitable upcycling and reduce landfill waste.”
According to public relations spokesperson representing Remoov, the company seeks first to refurbish and resell items it obtains, but Remoov will “responsibly dispose of any remaining items to the proper recycling facilities.”
In a summary of its previous activities, Remoov says it has diverted 560,000 cubic feet of material from landfills since being
Operating in the San Francisco Bay Area, Phoenix and South Florida, Remoov says it helps homeowners and businesses “get rid of and recycle their pre-owned goods in four ways: by picking up what the owners don't want; selling what they can for the owner’s profit; donating what they can; and responsibly disposing of any remaining items.”
Remoov thus far it has reduced America’s 12 million tons of annual landfill waste by some 3,150 tons. "Sustainability is at the core of our business, [and] our investors have a vested interest in supporting companies that have an impact beyond making money,” says Luis Perez, founder of Remoov.
“We are intentional about our business practices and believe that, as citizens of the world, we have a responsibility to prioritize environmental safety and ensure a healthy planet for future generations. We are especially excited to gain support from investors who align with our ideals and want to help us make the world a better place.”
Inspired by its impact, Remoov says investor LAT VC, the fund co-founded by Gary Acosta to invest in Latino-led, tech-enabled businesses, has made the new investment in the company.
“When evaluating potential investments, we look at the company’s potential for growth and also impact in our society,” says Acosta, a founding partner at LAT VC. “Remoov is ideally positioned to provide a service that can help every home and business while reducing global waste.”
LAT VC describes itself as a $100 million purpose-led venture fund that invests in early-stage United States Latino-led and owned businesses. Global executive Sol Trujillo leads the firm. He describes himself as the first U.S.-born Latino to lead a Fortune 200 company. Along with Trujillo, Acosta, Kennie Blanco and new partners Oscar Munoz and Laura Moreno, LAT VC says it is on a mission to change the face of venture capital and entrepreneurship.
Lithium-ion battery recycler will use crystallization technology from Veolia Water Technologies.
Toronto-based Li-Cycle Holdings Corp. has selected Veolia Water Technologies as a partner for its lithium-ion battery recycling plant in Rochester, New York. The company chose Veolia for its HPD crystallization technology.
Manon Painchaud, the communications project manager for Veolia, says crystallization is the process by which a solid forms from a liquid phase, where the atoms or molecules are highly organized into a structure known as a crystal. During the crystallization process, the desired components are selectively crystallized while undesirable impurities remain in the liquid.
The company describes the technology as the key in a final stage of the battery recycling process, as it allows a recycler to optimize the creation of nickel sulfate and cobalt sulfate from lithium-ion batteries and transforms them into high-purity raw materials, ready to be used in new batteries.
Li-Cycle will use Veolia’s HPD crystallizers to produce approximately 42,000 to 48,000 metric tons of nickel sulfate and 6,500 to 7,500 metric tons per year of cobalt sulfate annually. This material, Veolia says, can then be resold to battery manufacturers.
When fully operational in 2023, the Rochester facility will help “give life back to the equivalent of approximately 225,000 electric vehicle batteries per year,” the two companies say.
“At Li-Cycle, we are committed to doing our part to create a safer, cleaner and healthier world by striving to create a truly closed-loop lithium-ion battery supply chain to address these global challenges,” says Ajay Kochhar, CEO of Li-Cycle.
“Veolia is looking forward to partnering with Li-Cycle to help recover critical materials from lithium-ion batteries, so they can be reintroduced back into the supply chain,” says Vincent Caillaud, CEO of Veolia Water Technologies. “We have vast experience in the lithium production industry, where we enjoy a technology leadership position and will now apply our expertise in crystallization to battery recycling. Active throughout the entire value chain of battery recycling, Veolia is proud to take another step forward towards building a circular economy for lithium-ion batteries.”
Ned Coletta will become the waste and recycling firm’s president and chief financial officer in July.
Rutland, Vermont-based Casella Waste Systems Inc. has announced that its current Senior Vice President, Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and Treasurer Edmond “Ned” R. Coletta will assume the role of president and CFO effective July 1. In the president’s post, he will replace current president and chief operating officer (COO), Edwin D. Johnson, who plans to retire June 30.
Also, July 1, Casella says it plans to promote Sean M. Steves, its current senior vice president of operations, to senior vice president and COO of Solid Waste Operations; and to promote Jason M. Mead from his current role of vice president of finance to treasurer and senior vice president of finance.
“These exciting leadership changes follow a multi-year succession planning process,” says John W. Casella, the company’s board chair and CEO. “The board of directors and management have worked hard to identify and build the next generation of leaders throughout the organization to ensure continuity and more importantly to maintain and build upon our culture and core values.
“I would like to thank Ed for his service to the company and his solid contributions to our success,” adds Casella. “Ed has been a steadying force throughout his tenure with Casella, and his leadership style and embodiment of our values has helped to shape our winning culture. We have great confidence in the team that he has built over the last 12 years, and we believe that our key operating programs will continue his legacy.”
Casella Waste Systems describes itself as providing solid waste management services consisting of collection, transfer, disposal, and recycling services in the northeastern United States. In the Waste Today 2020 rankings of North America’s largest waste companies, Casella ranked in the top 12 and among the seven largest haulers in the municipal solid waste (MSW) sector.
May event in Bangalore, India, brings together auto, e-scrap and battery recyclers.
Organizers of the Recommerce Expo 2022 event say it will offer information and exhibits of interest to end-of-life vehicle (ELV), electronic scrap and battery recyclers. The conference has been scheduled for May 18-20 at The Lalit Ashok hotel and meeting space in Bangalore, India.
“Our core focus at all events will always be to increase efforts in recycling and provide a platform for individuals, entrepreneurs and businesses to learn about and carry out ‘recommerce’ activities,” says Deeksha M. Patel, one of the May event’s organizers.
Patel says programming connected to the expo will consist of “leading experts from the industry” who will address “the latest recycling technology, materials recovery solutions, policy framework, end-of-life strategies, and regulatory and business models to help reduce environmental impact.”
Adds Patel, “This event will give a stage to trade, debate and discuss the existing challenges and chart the way ahead for each sector. It suggests ways to bridge the gap between ensuring effective management and disposal channels.”
More information on Recommerce Expo 2022 can be found on this web page.