During a MRF Summit at WASTECON 2018 last month, more than 170 industry stakeholders gathered to gauge whether there was interest in moving away from single stream recycling.

WASTECON is the Solid Waste Association of North America’s largest event. This year’s conference was held in Nashville.

During the summit discussions, attendees cited concerns about major system changes, including confusing residents and disrupting existing collection systems. According to a Resource Recycling report, the majority of single stream programs use automated trucks, whereas dual stream programs largely use non-automated vehicles. And the automated collection factor brought up some safety implications.

Resource Recycling has more details:

Debates pitting single-stream versus dual-stream recycling have gained steam in recent months. But in a recent gathering of key stakeholders, the consensus was to stick with single-stream systems.

The forum was one of several group discussions at the MRF Summit hosted at WasteCon 2018 last month. Together, breakout groups made up a session titled “Facing the Music – Are We All Listening to Different Tunes?” After the three concurrent discussion sessions, members of each reported on their results to the wider audience.

Facilitated by Nat Egosi of RRT Design & Construction and Michael Timpane of Resource Recycling Systems (RRS), one breakout group sought to gauge whether there was widespread interest in moving away from single-stream recycling. The topic has received more attention in recent months, including in multiple Resource Recycling articles, as communities try to weather the downturn in recycling markets.

Read the full article here.