U.K. steel firm gains a foothold in the United States.

London-based Liberty House Group, part of the GFG Alliance operated by British industrialist Sanjeev Gupta, has completed its acquisition of the Georgetown steelworks in South Carolina in the United States. The idled mill was purchased from Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal in a move Liberty House calls “the first in a series of strategic North American acquisitions and new projects.”

The 600,000-square-foot plant includes a 540,000-metric-tons-per-year electric arc furnace (EAF) and a 680,000-metric-tons-per-year rod mill designed to serve the construction and automotive sectors. Liberty House indicates it plans to restart melting and rolling in the spring 2018 “as the first step in GFG’s ambitious investment plans for the American steel industry.”

The company states it is already in discussions regarding the acquisition of other steel assets in the U.S. and indicates it is researching new greenfield projects, which it expects to announce in 2018.

Liberty House indicates it will initially rehire 125 former employees at Georgetown and then build the workforce to 250 in the medium term. The group is targeting a major share of the U.S. market for domestically produced wire rod, demand for which is projected to grow substantially during 2018, according to the firm.

Completion of the Georgetown deal follows successful negotiations between Liberty and several stakeholders, including the United Steelworkers of America union (USW), Georgetown’s city council and the South Carolina State Government.

The mill site was a pivotal part of the state’s industrial infrastructure for nearly 70 years until it was shuttered in 2015, according to Liberty House, which indicates it “now aims to restore it to its former position of prominence and bring hundreds of skilled jobs back to the plant and to the local and state economy.”

Under an agreement with the USW, the company says it expects key roles on the furnace, casters and rolling mill to be filled by experienced former employees of the plant. The company also indicates it is in discussion with Georgetown’s city council about training programs to prepare a new generation of workers for the industry.

“Securing the Georgetown furnace and mill is a major milestone for us, marking our first major step in the U.S.,” says Gupta, executive chairman of the GFG Alliance. “The melting and rolling facilities here give us a formidable entry to the American market and provide a strong platform for expansion. We see major prospects for the metals industry here and we want to apply the same ‘Greensteel’ sustainable strategy to our American plants as we are already delivering in the United Kingdom and Australia. We’re grateful for the support we’ve have from the council, the state government and the union, and we look forward to rebuilding the business and bringing quality industrial employment back to the site and to the local and regional supply chain.”

He continues, “We’ve already had customers contacting us about placing orders, so we’re keen to get back up and running as quickly as possible.”

John Brett, president and CEO of ArcelorMittal USA, remarks, “Throughout the process, ArcelorMittal has been steadfast in our goal of maintaining the Georgetown steelmaking operation to preserve jobs and maximize the value of the property for our shareholders. While bittersweet for ArcelorMittal, we are hopeful that today’s announcement is a celebration for Liberty Steel and GFG Alliance, the United Steelworkers and the Georgetown community. We appreciate the patience of all of our stakeholders while we finalized this important transaction.”

Pleuger Techniek BV specializes in wastewater treatment.

Lünen, Germany-based Remondis has acquired the assets of Pleuger Techniek BV. Raymond Debrauwer, director of Eindhoven, Netherlands-based Pleuger, sees the acquisition as a positive development and continues to work at Pleuger, according to a news release issued by Remondis.

Pleuger Techniek, founded in 1962, focuses on the control and purification of community and industrial water. Pleuger has been supplying pumps and water systems to governments, industry and the offshore oil sector for 50 years. In addition, Pleuger installs, repairs and maintains the pumps and water systems for its customers. Its pumps are also used in geothermal heating applications and heat-cold storage.

“Remondis is the best partner in technical and commercial terms,” says Debrauwer. “The sale offers continuity and stability for both companies, but certainly also for the employees involved. Within Pleuger, we will continue to focus on our core business, where we can now make use of the wide expertise of the Remondis Group.”

Adds Dr. Andreas Krawczik, director of Remondis, “With the takeover of Pleuger, we made a conscious decision to expand our business activities in the south of the Netherlands. We are pleased that we can carry out service and maintenance work for many municipalities, water boards and contractors and will continue to do so in the future. Our companies have a lot of common ground, especially in the area of customer orientation and the high-quality requirements we set.”

Remondis, founded in 1934, describes itself as one of the world’s largest service providers in the areas of recycling, waste collection and wastewater treatment. 

China Customs conducts surprise inspections in mid-December.

A nationwide action organized by China’s General Administration of Customs (GACC) was conducted on Dec. 19, 2017, according to Steve Wong, executive president of the China Scrap Plastics Association (CSPA) and chairman of Hong Kong-based Fukutomi Co. Ltd.

In an email to CSPA members, Wong says the Dec. 19 effort focused on the smuggling of materials deemed to be solid waste, yet often recycled into secondary plastics. “During this crackdown, 47 illegal operations were exposed, and 127 suspects were arrested,” he says. This was the fourth round of such inspections, which are referred to by the GACC and other Chinese agencies as “blue-sky actions.” The Dec. 19 action involved more than 1,770 people from 19 GACC offices in China, “creating the biggest action in terms of scale and scope,” according to Wong.

Inspections took place in 13 Chinese provinces and cities, including Hebei, Jiangsu, Liaoning and Zhejiang provinces and the cities of Guangzhou (including the port of Huangpu), Hangzhou, Nanjing, Shantou and Tianjin. More than 7,700 tons of plastic scrap and rubber and other materials were seized, and GACC has indicated that record books seized showed some 323,000 tons of “solid waste” having been smuggled.

According to Wong, GACC has arrested 421 suspects and set up 298 criminal prosecution cases in 2017, with 866,800 tons of what the agency considers to be solid waste involved in those cases.

An online article from Xinhua, China’s state news agency, quotes GACC spokesperson Huang Songping as saying the origin of the seized materials was unclear, but that the country will continue to block imports of “foreign garbage.”

While workplace fatalities increased 7 percent from 2015, fatalities declined in the waste and recycling industry.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics’ “Census of 2016 Fatal Occupational Injuries” reports 5,190 workplace fatalities occurred in 2016, a 7 percent increase from 2015. The fatal injury rate also increased from 3.4 per 100,000 full-time equivalent workers in 2015 to 3.6 in 2016. The census was based on data from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). 

Despite this overall increase, in the public and private waste and recycling industry, fatalities declined from 50 in 2015 to 42 in 2016.

“This should give our industry a little encouragement that our organizational commitment to a strong safety culture and our safety processes are having an impact,” NWRA President and CEO Darrell Smith says in a news release responding to the OSHA data. He says the NWRA and its members will continue to look for opportunities to improve. “Zero is possible.”

Smith adds, “Since our board of trustees designated safety as a strategic initiative in 2015, NWRA has worked to provide its members with tools and outreach efforts including Safety Stand Downs and our Safety Professional Development Series, as well as collecting our own data from members to monitor trends in the industry. We are also preparing for additional programs in 2018.”

More workers lost their lives in transportation incidents than any other event in 2016, accounting for about 1 out of every 4 fatal injuries, OSHA says.

“In early 2016, NWRA convened an unprecedented industrywide Safety Summit to significantly reduce crashes, injuries and fatalities by building out sustainable prevention measures and engagement processes for a stronger industry safety culture,” NWRA National Safety Director Anthony Hargis says.

Over the past three years, NWRA and its chapters have championed “Slow Down to Get Around” legislation, which is now the law in 16 states and under consideration in several more. These laws require motorists slow down when waste and recycling collection vehicles are stopped and workers are getting on and off, just as motorists are required to slow down in construction work zones, stop for school buses and pull over for emergency vehicles.

The NWRA notes that fatalities declined at landfills and material recovery facilities (MRFs), while they remained the same in the waste collection industry. The refuse and recyclable material collector fatalities also declined to 31 as did the fatal work injury rate (34.1 per 100,000 full-time equivalent workers); however, this occupation retained its position at the fifth most dangerous industry.

Looking more broadly at the OSHA report, workplace violence injuries increased by 23 percent, making it the second most common cause of workplace fatality. The report also shows the number of overdoses on the job increased by 32 percent in 2016, while the number of fatalities has increased by at least 25 percent annually since 2012.

Loren Sweatt, OSHA deputy assistant secretary, says, “Today’s occupational fatality data show a tragic trend with the third consecutive increase in worker fatalities in 2016—the highest since 2008. America’s workers deserve better.”

She adds that OSHA will address the trends revealed by the report through enforcement, compliance assistance, education and training and outreach.

“As President Trump recognized by declaring opioid abuse a Nationwide Public Health Emergency, the nation’s opioid crisis is impacting Americans every day at home and, as this data demonstrates, increasingly on the job.

“The Department of Labor will work with public and private stakeholders to help eradicate the opioid crisis as a deadly and growing workplace issue.” 

The NWRA’s Hargis expresses the association’s desire to work with its members and partners to improve safety, saying, “NWRA is completely committed to achieving a positive and robust safety culture industrywide.”

Changes include new specs for rigid PVC and amendment to MRF guidelines.

The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), headquartered in Washington, has updated its Scrap Specifications Circular to include new specifications for rigid polyvinyl chloride (PVC) recyclables approved at its Fall Board Meeting Nov. 8, 2017. The circular also reclassifies “clean, dry double-polycoat food packages” within the “Guidelines for Inbound Curbside Recyclables for Material Recovery Facilities - Minimum Recommended Materials List.”

In a news release announcing the availability of the updated circular, ISRI says the new PVC specifications are intended to encompass more of the plastics recyclables that are actively trading in the scrap plastics marketplace. They can be found on pages 49-50 in the new edition of the Scrap Specifications Circular.

The association says the amendment to the material recovery facility (MRF) guidelines is a response to concerns within the recycling industry that by listing “clean, dry double-polycoat food packages” in its original location under Additional Materials for Inbound Curbside Recyclables for MRFs, it gave the impression that the material is preferred by MRFs.

“The reality is that the material is not preferred and may be considered prohibitive by MRFs who need a secondary market for their materials to remain viable economic and environmental partners with the communities they serve,” ISRI says.

The reclassification moves “clean, dry double-polycoat food packages” to the "Paper (not preferred or may be prohibited) with examples (not inclusive)" section of the inbound curbside recyclables guidelines (page 62).

ISRI’s Scrap Specifications Circular provides industry guidelines for buying and selling a variety of processed scrap commodities, including ferrous, nonferrous, paper, plastics, electronics, rubber and glass. More information about the rules governing the procedures for the addition, amendment or withdrawal of ISRI’s scrap specifications can be found in the Scrap Specifications Circular.

Comments, recommendations or questions about the specifications can be sent to ISRI’s Joe Pickard at jpickard@isri.org.