A recycling facility in Montgomery, Ala., that has been closed for two years is scheduled to reopen in January.

The plant originally opened in 2014—five years after the city’s curbside recycling program ended. The plant, which sorted recyclables from garbage collections, closed in 2016. Now, the city has entered into a 25-year contract with Repower South to bring the facility back to life.

The facility’s new business model will include a secondary revenue stream that will use recycled materials to produce a coal substitute.

WSFA News 12 has more details:

The city of Montgomery is getting back into the recycling business after a two-year absence. A first-of-its-kind plant that sorted recyclables from city garbage collections was closed in 2016. But a new agreement promises to bring the facility back to life.

The city has entered into a 25-year contract with Repower South, a South Carolina-based company that specializes in recycling and recovery. Work is underway to retrofit the Montgomery plant to better suit RePower South's needs. It is expected to open in January.

The plant originally launched in 2014 - five years after Montgomery’s curbside recycling program came to an end. The Montgomery Clean City Commission says the number of citizens who participated in the curbside program did not justify its cost. The new recycling plan would no longer require action on the part of the public. The new plant would accept garbage already being collected by city sanitation crews and then separate out materials that could be recycled.

Read the full article here.