Local recycling company reacts to California’s dropping recycle rate

The state’s recycling rate is at the lowest it’s been in five years. That number dropped to 47 percent in 2015 according to California’s latest waste and recycling report. Rick Bracamonte owns Palm Springs Recycling and said his industry is hurting.

“It has been getting tougher because of commodity prices probably overseas is contributing to that slower industries in the United States and at the same time the state has lowered its processing fees to us,” Bracamonte said.

He points to one reason the recycle rate dropped to 47 percent.

“Part of that number was down because of the governor cutting out commingling recycling to the public when they bring it in to us. They wouldn’t allow anything else today except for CRV material,” Bracamonte said.

He said California Redemption Value or CRV material makes up 95 percent of the things we drink and has a CRV label on it. He said that goes hand in hand with state landfill waste increasing by 2 million tons. Bracamonte said people think if there’s no incentive, why recycle?

“The other bottled material plastics that weren’t under the CRV compliance are now being thrown out because there’s no value to them and it goes to the land fills,” Bracamonte said.

The low price of oil and commodity prices dropping contributed to set backs for recycling companies.

Over the past 12 months, 631 recycling facilities in California have had to close down that’s because of $50 million worth of revenue loss. But Bracamonte said he’s not worried for his company.

“I see a lot of people recycling and a lot of people not only when they come in they bring everything they can because they know that there’s a place to get rid of it and possibly get a reward for it,” Bracamonte said.

Bracamonte said he thinks it’s still possible to reach the goal of getting the recycle rate to 75 percent by the year 2020.