New Hanover County’s newly approved recycling management agreement with Sonoco will not have a negative impact on local trash haulers’ business, according to Joe Suleyman, New Hanover County Environmental Management director.

“We are trying to get out of the waste processing business and give it to somebody - Sonoco - who does a very good job of it, and has many, many more markets,” Suleyman said Wednesday, referring to concerns expressed recently by a local trash hauler that the county might eventually take over all trash and recycling services.

As county and city of Wilmington officials moved quickly this week to approve an agreement with South Carolina-based Sonoco to upfit the former Wastec plant and create a materials recovery facility – known as a MRF – Suleyman heard from the hauler. He did not disclose the company's name.

Local haulers will still pick up recycling from the county's drop-off centers and individual customers and deliver it to the MRF, similar to what they have been doing at the current transfer center, Suleyman said.

“We have zero intention of getting into flow control,” he continued. In fact, since the roughly 16,000 tons of recycling currently generated annually by customers in Wilmington and in the unincorporated portions of New Hanover County will amount to less than half of the new MRF’s capacity, he hopes local haulers will have an incentive to serve new markets in adjacent areas with recycling pickup and drop off.

“One of the terms Sonoco and county have agreed to is that any of the beach towns in New Hanover County who want to piggy-back on the city’s agreement will be welcome to do that, but there is no requirement for anybody to use our facility,” he said.

The proposal to establish the MRF has taken shape very quickly in the face of an impending budget dilemma for the city of Wilmington. That problem, according to Wilmington public services director Richard King, is that the city’s recycling contract with Waste Management expires June 30. There is the expectation that the recycling drop-off cost per ton – currently $20 – could increase to as much as $40 per ton, he said at Tuesday’s city council meeting.

The city has not budgeted for that level of increase.

The agreement with Sonoco sets a $10 per ton drop-off fee, which could actually decrease if the value of the recycled materials from Wilmington and New Hanover County prove more valuable in the marketplace, Suleyman said. He explained that Sonoco's primary market for recycling it collects is itself: the global packaging company uses those materials for its own products, and is thereby shielded from much of the price fluctuations in the recycling market.

Progress on the MRF will continue to move quickly, according to Suleyman, who said, “Now that city council has approved the ILA [interlocal agreement], that’s my green light to finalize the county’s service contract with Sonoco. We’ve already agreed to the major terms; now we’re hashing out the minor details and expecting to get that done over the next week or so. This has been an all-out effort. We’ve gotten a lot of folks involved and everybody is working toward the same goal.”

Sonoco is slated to start its recycling handling services July 1. While the Wastec upfit is in progress, local recycling will be shipped to Sonoco's MRF in Jacksonville, North Carolina - one of 11 such facilities it operates in North Carolina, Suleyman said. Within 90 days, however, the local MRF will be ready to go, according to the terms of the contract.