Pittsburgh-based TMS International buys Cleveland-based Stein Steel Mill Services.

Pittsburgh-based TMS International, formerly known as Tube City IMS, says it has acquired the business and assets of Stein LLC and Stein Steel Mill Services LLC, both based in Cleveland.

TMS describes Stein as “a leading provider of high-quality services to steel producers throughout the United States.” The company provides metal producers with steel mill processing services such as slag removal and metallics reclamation, scrap handling, scrap management, recycling, raw material screening, material handling and maintenance and repair services.

“We are very excited to welcome Stein into the TMS organization,” says Raymond Kalouche, TMS president and CEO. “Stein has a long and distinguished history in our industry and nicely complements our existing services that we provide to world class steelmakers throughout the U.S. This acquisition is an excellent fit with our company and meaningfully strengthens our U.S. footprint and will provide a breadth and depth of resources and talent to us.”

TMS says Stein has a “high-quality customer base and more than 60 years in the industry,” and describes the firm as a family-owned business with approximately 500 employees. Stein provides services to customers in Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and South Carolina. TMS also says it plans to continue to operate Stein initially under its current brand name.

In 2019, Stein was involved in a legal dispute with the United Kingdom-based GFG Alliance and its Liberty Steel USA subsidiary over the mill services contract at the Liberty electric arc furnace (EAF) steelmaking facility in Georgetown, South Carolina.

TMS International describes itself as the largest provider of outsourced industrial services to steel mills in North America as measured by revenue, and as having “a substantial and growing international presence.”

North Carolina joint venture to purchase 50,000-tons-per-year secondary smelter from European firm.

Germany-based metals equipment and technology provider SMS Group says it will supply a secondary copper smelter to Ames Copper Group for its planned facility in Shelby, North Carolina. Ames is a joint venture between Connecticut-based wire processor and nonferrous recycler Prime Materials Recovery Inc. and Spain-based Cunext Group.

The proposed plant will produce up to 50,000 tons of copper anodes annually, according to SMS, with the plant startup scheduled for 2021.

SMS says the new plant will be the first secondary copper recycling facility in the United States to produce copper anodes from copper scrap and copper fines.

The equipment firm says its “scope of supply will include a tilting refining furnace, anode casting wheel, gas cleaning system, and electric and automation systems.” In addition to the equipment supplied, SMS will provide technical assistance for the installation and startup and be responsible for the layout of the core equipment, the company adds.

“With this important project, SMS underlines its strong position as a supplier of integrated solutions for the nonferrous metals industry,” the German company states.

Metalcorp NZ Ltd.’s stormwater treatment system achieves near-drinking-water quality.

A metal recycling facility in Christchurch, New Zealand, voluntarily installed stormwater treatment best management practices (BMPs) to demonstrate its commitment to raising environmental protection standards within the metal recycling industry in that country. The facility owners proactively installed stormwater treatment at its 1.5-acre facility, establishing a new benchmark for industrial stormwater quality under New Zealand’s Resource Management Act 1991 .

Industrial facilities in the United States are subject to similar stormwater discharge regulations and monitoring under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit program as mandated by the Clean Water Act. In the United States, these regulations typically are administered by individual states. In the case of the facility in New Zealand, monitoring and enforcement fall under the purvey of a city council. What is unusual about this facility in New Zealand is that the owner went the extra distance to ensure the environmental impact of the business operations was minimized to the greatest extent possible, meeting local discharge requirements in the process, and Christchurch City Council took notice.

Established in 1989, Metalcorp NZ Ltd. is a family-owned business that operates from two branches within the South Island of New Zealand. The primary function of Metalcorp is to collect and process ferrous and nonferrous scrap into the raw materials that other industries require to produce new products for domestic and international markets. Such facilities in the developed world are subject to varying degrees of stormwater pollutant discharge regulations. Metalcorp is no exception, yet the company is exceptional for its regard for the environment and the community. As a long-term member of the New Zealand Association of Metal Recyclers, Metalcorp demonstrated its commitment to raising the environmental protection standards within the metal recycling industry by proactively installing a series of stormwater treatment BMPs at one of its sites.

While Metalcorp was proactive in installing stormwater treatment to ensure that the company’s pollutant discharge was clean, it also was subject to stormwater compliance regulations outlined in Section 15 of New Zealand’s Resource Management Act. These regulations and the enforcement network, Environment Canterbury (ECan) of New Zealand, are analogous to the Clean Water Act and the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) NPDES permit program in the United States. Just as each U.S. state is given general guidelines to enforce stormwater discharge limits through a permit system under the Clean Water Act, each regional council in New Zealand has guidelines to follow when tailoring monitoring and enforcement to their regions. Because Metalcorp is in Christchurch City Council’s jurisdiction, compliance officers from Stormwater Audit, the compliance arm of the Council, monitored Metalcorp’s stormwater discharge compliance.

Routine monitoring action by the Christchurch City Council revealed that the facility had exceeded trigger levels for stormwater discharge of aluminum, copper, zinc, lead and magnesium. The trigger levels for Metalcorp were based on local regulations that set the levels required to be higher quality than drinking water—levels that are unnecessarily stringent for stormwater runoff. Despite being subject to this exceedingly high bar for stormwater quality, Metalcorp decided to proactively implement BMPs to bring the pollutant discharge levels down closer to trigger levels.

Not finding stormwater specialists within New Zealand willing to provide assurances that their products would meet the trigger levels if monitored, Metalcorp sought help from StormwateRx LLC, a United States-based stormwater treatment engineering and treatment equipment company. Korina Kirk, president of Metalcorp, met Calvin Noling, general manager of StormwateRx, which is based in Portland, Oregon, at the 2018 Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI) Annual Convention.

In 2019, resulting from a few months of site-specific retrofit design and site planning with StormwateRx engineers, Metalcorp installed a Clara 25C gravity separator upstream of an Aquip 110SBE media filter in its Christchurch facility. This combination of technologies provided oil and total suspended solids pretreatment followed by particulate and soluble metals removal—a strategy commonly employed at top-tier scrap recycling facilities in the U.S.

Metalcorp ran the StormwateRx units for an entire year before collecting and testing samples. The company submitted the test results to Stormwater Audits, a branch of New Zealand’s governing entity Christchurch City Council. The results demonstrated that Clara effectively removed bulk solids and metals, with Aquip further filtering the effluent. These BMPs together brought total suspended solids, aluminum, cadmium and chromium below the exceedingly low trigger levels while also significantly reducing copper, lead and zinc by greater than 98 percent. All of the treated stormwater quality values were below U.S. EPA benchmark standards for the multisector general permit and industrial stormwater general permits.

Based on the results, which assume 1.3 acres for C1-C3 and 26 inches average rainfall for Christchurch, the Christchurch City Council calculated that Clara and Aquip are mitigating an estimated 1,224 pounds of chemical oxygen demand, 2 tons of solids, 35 pounds of aluminum, 4.4 pounds each of copper and lead and 110 pounds of zinc per year from Halswell Junction Outfall, the watershed most affected by runoff from the Metalcorp facility. As the Council Advisor put it: “Not quite drinking water quality, but nearly!”

*All New Zealand metals parameters measured as acid extractable.

**2020 Draft US EPA MSG Permit, freshwater discharge, metals values as total with assumed receiving water hardness of 250 mg/L.

This case study was submitted by StormwateRx LLC, Portland, Oregon. More information is available at www.stormwaterx.com. 

Kevin Hudson of WestRock offers some trends and insights on how e-commerce habits are affecting recycling and packaging.

The presence of e-commerce had been growing in recent years, and its presence boomed this year in part because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I think everyone is seeing significant growth in e-commerce, with people avoiding face-to-face interactions right now,” says Kevin Hudson, senior vice president of Forest Resources and Recycle Fiber at Atlanta-based WestRock.

Prior to the pandemic, Hudson says e-commerce had been growing but not too rapidly. He says it seemed as if some people were still hesitant to order online. However, he says, the pandemic has forced some of those people to begin ordering online.

“More and more people stepped into e-commerce [in 2020],” he says. “That’s not necessarily a trend but an observation of what’s to come.”

E-commerce growth impacts containerboard and corrugated box industries as well as old corrugated containers (OCC) recycling several ways. Recycling Today followed up with Hudson in December to gauge how e-commerce is affecting the containerboard and recycling industries.

Recycling Today (RT): What are some of the biggest trends you are noticing with online shopping and e-commerce? How do these trends impact WestRock?

Kevin Hudson (KH): I think that e-commerce has accelerated more sustainability components of packaging. The second thing I’ve seen is our customers’ increasing focus, as e-commerce becomes a larger part of business, is on right-sizing packaging. This is a key area, certainly, WestRock is positioned well with box sizers to help create shipping boxes that are better suited for products. I think in that process, you’re going to have several key advantages for our customers and consumers. Consumers are focused on environmentally friendly sustainable packaging. As you right-size, you’ll see less fiber used, so that’s a good thing. You’re also going to see improved protection for the products as the industry grows its focus on e-commerce.

RT: How are e-commerce trends impacting recovered paper markets? What does a surge in e-commerce mean for recycled commodities?

KH: I’m cautious on any statements related to supply and demand—that’s not my place to speculate. But in general, just an increase in e-commerce by itself would not change one way or another demand for overall fiber-based packaging. There is a broader global economy that will play in there. So, what does commercial manufacturing and the retail sector demand for boxes—how does that change as e-commerce changes? That I can’t speculate on.

But as more shifts are made to an e-commerce platform, we do anticipate the collection of boxes to change. I don’t think it specifically creates a surge in demand; I don’t think it’s directly correlated. It goes back to balance between e-commerce, commercial, retail and manufacturing presence. It does change the dynamics of collection.

Today, you go back in time two years, as more volume was in the retail stores or commercial outlets, obviously the collection of [old corrugated containers, or OCC] was clean and pure. Boxes were sent to consumers in that form. As you see more e-commerce, changes will be more focused on how do you sort material to get clean OCC that you had been getting from behind-store collection programs? How much of that OCC will be collected from an e-commerce chain or residential recycling chain versus behind-store collection? Of that volume that shifts from behind store to residential collection, how much of that volume will be smaller boxes, and how will those boxes be sorted from other single-stream materials such as plastics and aluminum all has to be sorted now at residential single-stream facilities instead of commercial sorting facilities. That plays a larger role in the near-term future—what is the sorting capacity of recycling operations today versus what they need to be managed.

RT: How much has the pandemic affected e-commerce trends you’re mentioning?

KH: My opinion is this has shifted over time. I think initially I thought we’d see an initial increase in e-commerce and then as the virus came under control, you’d see a lag back to historic norms. But I think COVID has truly shifted the mindset at least in the U.S. population of the acceptance of e-commerce as a viable alternative. Even now, you see some larger retail stores with the carryout or delivery of products to households, not necessarily through Amazon or whatnot but through store platforms themselves. People are becoming more used to that as a way to shop. Certainly, I think all of the surge in e-commerce participation is driven by COVID. I think COVID has been here long enough and manufacturers and retail centers have adapted to where I think it will stay. More of this increase will stay than what I originally thought.

RT: What does the increased e-commerce use look like from your perspective?

KH: What we’re seeing with our customers is trends forcing them to shift fast. If you think about it, retail has had a stable platform and e-commerce was a piece of it. [Before COVID], e-commerce grew in retail programs but at a level that was predictable. Now, I think what you see is customers need to shift fast.

It’s not just online shopping. A lot of the pandemic has brought about that forced consumers to change how they consume even takeout food. Takeout food is much more the norm than sitting at a restaurant. If you look at actual takeout packaging, people want to know that the takeout packaging has not been tampered. WestRock created Bio-Pak to protect food containers; it provides consumers with a high level of confidence that their takeout has not been contaminated.

RT: What are some advances in sustainable packaging that have been innovative this past year?

KH: The CanCollar product is one. If you think about it, you have traditionally had plastic collars to hold six-pack beverages together. We’ve created a fiber-based replacement can collar to replace difficult-to-recycle plastic collars. So, this is another area where enhancing the use of fiber-based products that are easy to recycle and replacing other less-recycled materials is an area we’ve really got a lot of groundwork with.

While we say advances, I think really just focusing on what can be recycled is just as important. You’ve heard us talk about our partnership with Domino’s. In this process, we’ve participated in several studies to understand what level of grease and residues from pizza that would be left on the pizza box—how much is acceptable in recycling? We discovered the volume of grease and other materials in there is acceptable to filter out and make good paper from. This is a huge study and project we’ve had with Domino’s. … This is an area we have to work with customers to help people understand they can recycle this material.

Becky Berube of United Catalyst Corp. shares techniques for preventing converter theft and getting the most value for these items.

The precious metals markets are up, and so are the incidences of stolen catalytic converters. It is all over the news. The BBC recently reported that catalytic converter thefts have doubled in England as metal prices have risen.

If you are a recycler, this is not news to you. At United Catalyst Corp., Greenville, South Carolina, we are seeing recyclers send smaller lots more frequently to reduce the risk of theft and move the converters quickly.

If you have been the victim of stolen converters, there is nothing worse than finding your converters have been sold to a converter collector down the road or to a processor. The problem needs a solution from both sides: the recycler and the processor.

Being from Massachusetts, it easy to quote Bill Belichick: “Do your job.” But, because so many of you are not New England Patriots fans, let me throw a few other quotes at you. Ben Franklin said, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure” regarding fire safety. In Full Metal Jacket, Gunnery Sergeant Hartman says to Private Gomer Pyle about theft from his unlocked footlocker, “If it wasn’t for [expletive] people like you, there wouldn’t be any thievery in this world.”

You must do everything in your power to stop the theft of your catalytic converters, which, in short, means you need to think like a thief.

Over the past 30 years, we have seen some creative converter storage solutions in yards. The most original might have been in Vermont. A recycler took an empty 2,000-gallon tank and dropped the converters in the top like a piggy bank. He dug a moat around it. When it was time to get the converters out, he took the loader and dumped them out. Sound crazy? It was effective.

A more common solution is buying an ocean freight container to store the convertors in. One recycler we recall had an alarm and video surveillance on his container. One weekend, he broke into it himself to see how long it would take the police to get there. If it had been a real robbery, the converters likely would have been gone. At least you would have the video of the theft. However, a deer cam will not cut it. That will only snap a picture every time someone walks by. You need a good surveillance system.

Remember, nothing beats you and an employee that you trust walking the perimeter of the property looking for tall grass that can conceal an intruder or a hole in the fence through which a thief can gain access to the yard after hours.

Another way to safeguard against theft is knowing your count and secretly marking your cats. If your cat count is consistently short when you sell, start marking them in a way that is known only to you. Pick a color each week or month and spray inside the cat. If someone takes your converter and tries to come back and sell it to you, you’ve got them.

If you are selling by the piece, never say to the converter company, “You know where they are.” That is license to steal. Never let the company put the halves on the truck until you inspect them. If a converter is worth $300 and it’s three-quarters full, why would you take half price when the guy is going to sell it as full? If you have an employee overseeing the sale, make sure to show up at the beginning and toward the end of the sale. Stay until the transaction is complete and the payment is made to avoid your employee receiving a kickback from the converter company. If you introduce a new converter company to your yard and your employee objects or is hostile toward the new company, it is possible he or she is getting a kickback. Many employees might not consider this stealing but rather getting their piece of the pie.

Bottom line: Be meticulous about safeguarding your valuables by using locks, video, counts and personnel you can trust. The primary responsibility lies with you.

When it comes to buying stolen converters, collectors and processors need to do their parts to research and know their customers. Bad actors must be eliminated from this industry. Companies and associations must refuse to do business with such criminals. If the good players in the supply chain would scrutinize the suppliers and refuse to purchase conflict material, we could stop the underground movement of stolen material into refining.

If you finally made the switch from selling your converters by the piece to selling them on assay, you might have found that it is totally worth it. Your average cat sales likely are up 5 percent to 45 percent, depending on how you were being treated by your buyer.

Now you are in the real game: refining. You’re selling your converters based on the actual value of the three metals they contain. You are hedging and selling metal into the market. Sure, you might have to wait a little longer for your money, but with an early payment and the balance in 30 to 45 days, you are ahead of the game with more money toward your bottom line.

With assay, what could go wrong when you are selling on science and getting paid on actual metal markets?

For nearly 30 years we have been processing scrap catalytic converters for refining at United Catalyst Corp. Let me explain what can and does go wrong. And, more importantly, how you can fix it.  

In converter processing, everything begins and ends with counts and the weights of your lots, converters, pallets, shrink wrap and all. We begin with the end in mind. Bill of lading weights must match. Unit counts must match what you sent in. All weights in and out of the converter processing facility should be accounted for and balanced.

If you are missing weight, you’re missing money. But if you are missing dust, you are missing significantly more money. The dust has the highest concentration of the platinum group metals, or PGMs. The dust might be 1 percent to 3 percent of the weight of the load while being 10 percent to 20 percent of the value. Therefore, we suggest letting those with expert systems decan for you. After ensuring the account is accurate, the decanning system is paramount to getting paid the correct amount.

Did you know that when you sell on assay and refining terms that you are settling on the results of a sample of your load? After decanning the converters, the catalyst must be milled into a powder and a representative sample must be taken to be tested. That sample is only 5 percent to 10 percent of your material, so it had better represent all your converters. Sampling is a science. The first analysis using X-ray fluorescence (XRF) is only plus or minus 10 percent accurate. That could be a 20 percent swing in price! The final analysis is another scientific process. You do not want to get paid on XRF. Do you know if you are getting paid on XRF?

A properly collected sample that represents all the converters in your load then goes through two more advanced scientific processes called pyro- and hydrometallurgy, or fire assay with chemical dissolution and atomic absorption with an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP-MS). Now, your processor might have fire assay and an ICP lab in-house and pay you quickly based on the assay result they get; however, this is not the same as being paid on the assay result from the refiner or a third-party independent lab. Processing and refining take time. There are no shortcuts to getting paid accurately. 

Finally, metal prices can be problematic when selling on assay. First, let me say this is a problem for all of us in the business of selling metal. It is an opaque market, which means it is hard to clearly see the price. Your metal does not come out of refining for about 100 days. This means to lock in a price for you, we must sell metal forward on a futures contract. Because you are recycling scrap catalytic converters, that means we are selling a product called sponge to coat new catalyst and make industrial products. We are not selling bars, ingot or bullion to the investment market. There is a discount on the metal price and a lease rate. Both come off the spot or physical price you see published online. Both can be calculated, but they are not readily disclosed to us. This can be confusing when you get a metal price that is different than the price you see online. This also can be an area of ambiguity. Can and will your processor explain the spread to you?

Selling converters on assay is the only way to ensure that you get paid the most from your converters with a process you can trust. However, it is still your responsibility to educate yourself and make sure the processor you choose is doing what it says it is doing and following the rules of assay. You buy the car. You own the converter. The lion’s share of its value is yours.

Becky Berube is the president of United Catalyst Corp., Greenville, South Carolina. She is a member of the Automotive Recycling Association’s Educational Programming Committee and president of the International Precious Metals Institute. She can be contacted at berube@unitedcatalystcorporation.com. To subscribe to United Catalyst Corp.’s daily e-newsletter or get PGM prices texted twice daily to your phone, text 60-Second Report or Daily Double to 864-834-2003 or email sales@unitedcatalystcorporation.com.