Recommend approval to renew an annual contract for recyclable material processing with Pratt Recycling (Atlanta, GA)^(D) for up to $734,000. The Sanitation Department uses the contract to process all single-stream recycling material collected by the City of Savannah.  Approximately 5,200 tons of material was collected over ten months last year with collection operations suspended for two months due to pandemic impacts. Projected tonnage for the full year without service interruption would have been on the order of 6,200 tons. The current annual contract price of $150.00 per ton reflects increased costs within the market.

Background Information

The City of Savannah has provided twice a month residential single-stream curbside recyclables collection since 2009. Collected materials were originally processed by Pratt Recycling, Inc. under a ten-year service agreement. Strong demand for recyclable material feedstocks, especially in overseas markets, resulted in a favorable rebate to the City of $15.00 per ton delivered. Strong offshore demand continued for most of the decade, providing ready markets for 35% of recyclables collected in the United States. However, the market changed precipitously nationwide in 2018, when China effectively banned importation of recyclables from the United States. Domestic markets could not readily absorb the resultant material glut and creation of excessive demand above processing capacity with this change. Pratt Recycling honored its rebate commitment until the scheduled service agreement conclusion. The current annual contract price of $150.00 per ton reflects increased costs within the market.

The single-stream collection service is provided through eight collection teams. The original program design assumed a 30% participation rate on a customer base of 47,000 residential accounts for a total usage by 14,100 households. The residential account base has grown to 52,000 units and actual participation, based on thrice yearly set out counts, is consistently at 47 – 48%, or 24,960 households. Thus, actual service demand is 175% of designed collection capacity. 

Items currently accepted include clean materials such as, paper, old corrugated cardboard, metals, hard plastics, and container glass. Films such as plastic bags, foils, and multi-material items are not suitable. Locally collected recyclables are delivered to the nearby Pratt Recycling, Inc. transfer station and then transported to Pratt’s Conyers, Georgia processing facility. Here the recyclables are separated into component material streams. Paper and old corrugated cardboard are sent to an on-site paper mill for remanufacturing. Other recyclable streams are aggregated for transport to other remanufacturing plants. Combustible nonrecyclable waste products are processed into synthetic gas for energy recovery on-site and non-combustibles are landfilled. A current materials audit indicates waste materials comprise 30% of total deliveries. Of this amount, approximately one third to one half is container glass.

Approximately 5,200 tons of material was collected over ten months last year with collection operations suspended for two months due to pandemic impacts. Projected tonnage for the full year without service interruption would have been on the order of 6,200 tons. Elimination of glass from handling in the recycling system would result in a drop of about 1,000 tons annually and reduce costs by $150,000.00. Removal of glass from the single-stream program will also reduce unit processing fees by providing cleaner feedstock and reducing processor costs over time.

While glass is now deemed a contaminant in single-stream materials recovery, there are new emerging markets for source separated glass. 

The original contract was bid and approved by Council on December 20, 2018. This is the second of three annual renewal options available.

(D) Indicates non-local, non-DBE business.

Approval