Latest News

Member Services Representatives noticed that trucking prices have recently increased, so we reached out to Mike Schafer, Sales Team Leader at Total Quality Logistics (TQL) to ask why. Basically, there are a lot more full tractor trailer loads of recyclables available right now than there are trucks. Once COVID-19 started and businesses shut down, there were many more trucks than there were loads due to all of the closings and businesses not shipping material. Those factors drove the cost of trucking March-June of 2020 way down to where drivers weren’t making a whole lot of money and it put about 80,000 of them out of business. That...

In October 2020, NRRA Executive Director Reagan Bissonnette recorded a MassRecycle Podcast episode with Gretchen Carey and Waneta Trabert, President and Vice President of MassRecycle. They discussed NRRA's glass recycling programs, including NRRA's new glass recycling StoryMap, which shows how over 100 municipalities in NH, VT and MA are successfully recycling glass for over 500,000 residents. They also talked about how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted municipal solid waste and recycling facility operations, as well as recycling markets. The 35-minute episode was recently published and is available for anyone to listen. Reagan...

Celebrating 40 Years of Making Recycling Strong Did you know that 2021 marks NRRA's 40th anniversary? In 1981, four New Hampshire municipalities founded the Northeast Resource Recovery Association, then called the New Hampshire Resource Recovery Association, to provide a clearinghouse for current, up-to-date information and a source of technical and marketing assistance in the general areas of waste reduction and recycling. Since then, membership in NRRA has grown to include over 400 municipalities, individuals, and businesses in New England. We're asking our members to help us celebrate our 40th anniversary by sharing how NRRA has...

NRRA Annual Compost Bin Sale is Back for 2021! Individuals are more likely to compost their food scraps if they have the tools/equipment readily accessible at their home. Help offset the amount of food scraps ending up in your town's MSW by offering Compost Bin Sale items for sale to your residents! Items Available to Order (MUST ORDER in full pallets): Compost Bins Compost Turners Rain Barrels Kitchen Pails Get All the Information & Sign Up for the Sale! Why should NRRA municipal members consider participating in this compost bin sale? Food scraps are heavy, and therefore expensive to dispose of as municipal solid waste. Nationwide...

Marc Morgan, Solid Waste Manager for the City of Lebanon and Member of NRRA, is helping to demystify recycling as part of the Beyond the Curb: Recycling 101 course at the Osher Life-Long Learning Institute at Dartmouth. Virtual classes included talking about the global impacts of recycling, contamination, emerging technologies and more. Classes were taught by NRRA's Executive Director, Reagan Bissonnette, on recycling markets, and by Member Services Representative, Heather Herring, on behavior change and recycling. This engaged group of NH and VT residents had thoughtful questions for the presenters with a lively dialogue that they...

At NRRA’s February 10th Member Operations Marketing (MOM) meeting, Rick Norton, Market Area Manager from Universal Recycling Technologies, gave a thorough presentation on how they process electronic and universal waste at their Dover, NH facility. NRRA has a long-standing relationship with URT as a solid vendor with a fantastic reputation in the field. They have an 80,000 square foot facility that accepts 4-6 truckloads a day of material and has 40 employees. Rick shared an informative video and commented on the path of computers, TVs, cellphones, batteries, fluorescent lamps, mercury thermostats and more that are inventoried...

Expanding our Member Services Department NRRA is expanding our Member Services team by moving all our educational programs under the Member Services Department. Bonnie Bethune will continue to serve as NRRA's Member Services Manager. Heather Herring has moved from her role as Education Manager to become a Member Services Representative. In that role, Heather will support our members with cooperative marketing and purchasing and technical assistance while continuing her prior focus on NRRA's educational programs, including coordinating Member Operations Marketing meetings and educating students through our School Recycling Club. In...

Over 100 communities in the Northeast U.S. work together to move recovered glass to two downstream outlets. They also found a unique way to communicate the process to the public. By Reagan Bissonnette At a time when depressed recycling markets and negative news stories about recycling have residents across the country wondering what actually happens to their recyclables, the industry could use a case study that highlights recycling sustainability. One such example can be found in efforts around glass recovery in the Northeast U.S., where the recycling nonprofit group Northeast Resource Recovery Association (NRRA) has worked with...

As an alternative to NRRA’s usual fall bus tour, NRRA Staff and municipal members joined ecomaine staff on January 13 for a private virtual tour of their Portland, Maine facilities followed by a question and answer session about their processes. In one campus, ecomaine runs a single-sort facility since 2006, offers food waste recovery, operates a waste-to-energy plant, and also has room for a landfill on site. Ecomaine’s goal is the reduction of waste generated; reuse of resources; recycling and employing materials back into the marketplace; composting or digestion of organic waste; creating electricity via waste-to-energy; and...

In response to questions from our members, NRRA reviewed the available information about when solid waste operators can expect to receive the COVID-19 vaccine, and how to handle disposal of any vaccine waste received at transfer stations. Availability of COVID-19 Vaccine for Solid Waste Operators The availability of the COVID-19 vaccine for solid waste operators varies by state. In New Hampshire and Vermont, the vaccine distribution plans do not provide a specific category for solid waste operators. Instead, solid waste operators will have access to the vaccine depending primarily on age and medical vulnerability based on a range of...