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container at Bloomingdales project |
Spring construction projects have brought an influx of construction and demolition debris to San Francisco’s iMRF, which handles 275 tons of material per day.
On jobsites, workers sort building debris into large metal boxes designated for specific materials, such as unpainted wood, concrete, metal and sheetrock. The boxes are brought to the iMRF, which is operated by SF Recycling & Disposal, a Norcal Waste Systems Inc. company.
The facility recovers between 74 and 77 percent of the material unloaded onto the tipping floor. Those materials are either reused or made into new products—metals are taken to an East Bay scrap yard and shipped to different foundries, while concrete is crushed and used in road construction and in mixing new cement.
Workers building the Bloomingdale’s West Coast store on the former site of the Emporium San Francisco have filled more than 135 debris boxes since March 2004. Some 494 tons of debris, including wood, dirt, concrete and other materials, have been recycled from the Bloomingdale’s site, according to Robert Reed of Norcal Waste Systems. To date, the project has achieved a recycling rate of nearly 77 percent.
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And at the new Federal Building project, which is scheduled to be completed in the summer of 2006, 7,200 tons of debris has been recycled since work began in April 2003, says Jake Nickman, project engineer for the general contractor, Dick/Morganti Joint Venture group.