UNIVERSITY RECYCLING GROWS DESPITE SLUMP IN RECYCLABLE MARKET

CAPE GIRARDEAU -- A campus recycling program at Southeast Missouri State University continues to grow despite slumping markets for some recyclable materials.

"We're alive and well for the next three months," said Annette Adams, who heads the university's recycling committee.

The university's program began last September. But three months later it was facing a major problem.

VIP Industries, which had been the primary processor of recyclable materials in Cape Girardeau, abandoned the recycling operation at the end of the year. VIP officials said declining markets for recyclable materials made the operation unprofitable.

The university had been paying VIP Industries to take the recyclable paper and cardboard. With VIP out of the picture, Southeast turned to Heartland Resource Recovery, a local recycling firm owned by Roger Friedrich.

The new contract began at the end of December and runs through May 15, said Adams.

Under the contract, Friedrich is furnishing a 40-foot trailer, where office paper and cardboard are collected. The university is paying Friedrich's company $150 a month for rental of the trailer and for hauling off the recyclable materials. Friedrich, in turn, sells the paper and cardboard to St. Louis area recycling companies.

Southeast has also entered into a contract with Sides Steel Supply & Metal Recycling Co. of Cape Girardeau for the disposal of aluminum cans and other recyclable metal materials. Under that contract, Sides provides a trailer for the collection of cans and provides other bins for metal materials, and pays Southeast for the items.

The recycling trailers are on the north end of the campus, Adams said. "We've got those padlocked because we want to control what goes in there."

The bins, she added, have proved useful. "It's really helped in how we have handled scrap (metal) materials."

Said Adams, "There has always been a market for sheet metal and cast iron."

Aluminum cans also bring a price, generally anywhere from 37 to 42 cents a pound, depending on the size of the load, said Adams.

Southeast's recycling program has been implemented in university offices and in some of the residence halls.

Adams said plans call for expanding the program this spring to include the five remaining dormitories on campus Towers South, East and West; Cheney Hall; and Myers Hall.

Over the first three months of the program, 24 tons of paper and 1,500 pounds of aluminum cans have been recycled.

The university population (faculty, staff and students) totals about 9,000, said Adams.

"We figured out that over three months that's almost five cans per person."

Those 1,500 pounds of recycled cans save 2,000 gallons of fuel that would otherwise be expended for production of new aluminum cans.

The 24 tons of paper amounts to 5 pounds per person, based on the university population. "About 400 trees could be saved if all that paper is truly recycled," said Adams.

About 80 percent of the recycled paper was office paper. The remainder was cardboard.

"The sad part," said Adams, "is we don't have anyone who will take newspapers right now." Currently there is no recycling market for newspapers.

Before the recycling program started, the university was paying about $63,000 a year in trash-disposal costs.

The recycling program has yet to really lower those costs, said Adams. "We estimated only $500 to $800 in savings for the first three months of the program." But Adams said, "I'm sure down the road there will be more of a payoff."

Still, she said, regardless of the financial picture recycling is important from an environmental standpoint.

Adams said the recycling program keeps getting better. "We don't want to let it slip," she said.