Coalition looks for ways to recycle vinyl siding

By Karen Hanna  

A pilot project now entering its second year could help recyclers develop strategies for exploiting a largely untapped reservoir of recyclable materials — the vinyl siding torn off homes when installers replace it.  

“The product’s been in the marketplace since the ’50s, so there’s a lot of product that may be coming to the end of its useful life,” said Matt Dobson, VP of the Vinyl Siding Institute (VSI). 

With 14 collection sites and three recyclers, the Vinyl Siding Recycling Coalition is trying to find ways to recover value from the material.  

Though the 25 plants that make vinyl siding in the U.S. all recycle in-house waste, installers typically chuck cast-offs, sending it to landfills, Dobson said. When it comes to dealing with the material generated on housing sites, contamination is one issue, he explained. 

“When you get it out of the field, it needs to be clean,” Dobson said. “You’ve got to get the nails out of it; it can’t be contaminated.” 

Logistics are an issue — but that’s true whether installers and recyclers muster ways to ship, store and clean old siding, or installers opt to just throw it out, Dobson said. 

“Everybody will always say, ‘Well, it cost too much’ … You have to almost change your mindset, because you're already paying for dumpsters going into the landfill,” Dobson said. “It’s not any more difficult to pay for a dumpster … [than it is] to go into a collection bin that’s going to these recyclers.” 

In a report VSI provided about the project, Sylvia Moore, director of technical development for Shintech Inc., an Akron, Ohio, resin producer, observed that the coalition’s work comes as lawmakers on the state and national levels push for ways to generate funds for handling some end-of-life materials.  

Proposals like extended-producer responsibility legislation would put some of the burden for waste disposal on the products’ manufacturers.  

“What’s valuable about the coalition is that when extended-producer responsibilities (EPRs) start to get passed in different states, we can bring our model in and say, ‘We got this,’ ” Moore said.  

One recycling company trying to address the need is JPI Industrial, which in recent years has added three plants — including two plants in North Carolina just 40 miles from each other.   

“People asked why we took on two operations that were close together, and the answer was simple – the demand for vinyl siding recycling is high,” Director of Operations Nicholas Puckett said in the VSI report. 

The company’s 200-plus employees currently recycle 250 million pounds of PVC across the U.S. 

Initially the vinyl recycling pilot might result in just a couple thousand more pounds of additional recycled material, Dobson said, but if the effort works, a lot more is in the pipeline. 

Recycled vinyl could be used in any type of durable rigid vinyl products, such as siding, deck boards and railings, he said. 

If recyclers’ efforts are successful, they just might find a burgeoning supply of new — and valuable — plastic to reclaim. 

New siding is in demand, meaning more old stuff will be coming down. 

“Essentially, we’re producing as fast as we can, but we’re not keeping up with the current demand,” Dobson said. 

Contact:  

Vinyl Siding Institute Inc., Alexandria, Va., www.vinylsiding.org  

Karen Hanna, senior staff reporter

[email protected]