AOR focuses on carton recycling

AOR focuses on carton recycling

By Ali Briggs, Resource Recycling

The most recent Association of Oregon Recyclers (AOR) forum meeting on Sept. 21 discussed the challenges and opportunities for carton recycling in the state, featuring perspectives from the Carton Council, mills, MRFs and local government.

The Carton Council is looking to expand curbside collection of cartons and create strong end markets. Their efforts were described as "voluntary producer responsibility." They are willing to provide capital support for sorting facility upgrades, e.g. co-invest in optical sorters. The goal is to make it economically viable to collect and separate cartons — historically (in Oregon) carton separation has not been worth it financially.

The meeting also featured discussion of a study on comingled recycling and described the types of mills that can accept cartons. Only 15-17 percent of cartons end up in commingled recycling and less than 5 percent of cartons get recycled at the appropriate market.

Discussion focused on areas to improve carton recycling, such as recycling programs at elementary schools for the significant number of milk cartons. A question and answer session focused heavily on public education and the outreach challenge of explaining why cartons can be recycled but other similar-looking items cannot, such as frozen food containers or ice cream cartons.

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