Pacific Allied Products receives EPS recycling award

Pacific Allied Products, a major plastics manufacturer located on Oahu, Hawaii, has been presented with the EPS Industry Alliance’s 2016 Excellence in EPS Recycling Award. Created in 2013, the award is given to a company or organization that has proven its commitment to expanded polystyrene (EPS) recycling, according to the EPS Industry Alliance, Crofton, Maryland.

Pacific Allied Products is the only EPS manufacturer in Hawaii, producing roofing and construction products as well as shape molded insulated containers for the aquaculture and recreational industries. Through the company’s recycling program, the Hawaiian Recycling Initiative, Pacific Allied Products has greatly increased the recycling production of EPS in its state over the past decade, now totaling 775,000 pounds of foam per year, currently gathered from 54 different companies. Pacific Allied has accomplished this by investing in an EPS densifier machine, while also reusing the EPS resin bead sacks to ship the then densified foam out of the state, where it is recycled into picture frames and other plastics products. For the company’s efforts, Pacific Allied has been issued a permit by the state of Hawaii to become a certified, approved recycling center for EPS foam.

“Manufacturing on an island in the middle of the Pacific presents its own unique challenges and we needed to find a solution for the disposal of our foam waste that would be both cost-effective and environmentally friendly,” says Pacific Allied Products President Bernie Coleman. He adds, “It’s a win-win for everyone.”

Other nominees for the award this year were celebrated for their contributions to the recycling community, says the EPS Industry Alliance. They include the city of Airdrie in Alberta, Canada, which collected EPS by tractor-trailer loads and demonstrated a method to bale the EPS for more economical transport; Buckeye Industries in Cleveland, Ohio, for providing vocational training to adults with developmental disabilities to assist in EPS recycling; the University of Wisconsin, Madison, for its program Boxable, which established a reuse and recycling system for EPS that has spread to the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign and the University of Washington in St. Louis; and Sedona Recycles in Sedona, Arizona, for diverting EPS from landfills through use of a densifier.

Representing various aspects of the recycling and sustainability communities, the judges for this year’s award included Nina Goodrich, executive director of GreenBlue; Brenda Pulley, vice president of recycling for Keep America Beautiful; Lisa McTigue Pierce, executive editor of Packaging Digest; and Patty Moore, president and CEO of Moore Recycling Associates Inc.

The Excellence in EPS Recycling Award recognizes the achievements of the companies and organizations that work toward advancing and improving EPS recycling through innovation and expansion.