The Joint Legislative Air and Water Pollution Control and Conservation Committee’s first Environmental Issues Forum of 2013 will be held February 11 at 12:00 noon in Room G-50, K. Leroy Irvis Building.

The forum will focus on a new business partnership involving two Pennsylvania businesses to collect and recycle used plastic well pad liners from Marcellus shale gas drilling sites. Speakers will describe the opportunities presented by the partnership, the economic and environmental impact of the process, and future plans.

The guest speakers will be: David La Fiura, vice-president of Ultra-Poly Corporation, Portland, Pa; and Scott Fought, vice-president of Operations of WellSpring Environmental Services, Orwigsburg, Pa.

The partnership was facilitated by the PA Recycling Markets Center, Inc.. Both companies are members of the RMC’s Center of Excellence, a network of recycled materials processors and end users of recycled materials.

Ultra-Poly is one of the largest recyclers of polyethylene and polypropylene plastic in North America and has built a recycling plant in the Berwick area specifically for processing the liner material. WellSpring has developed special equipment for separating well pad liners on site so that it can be trucked away in a single trailer load.

In describing the partnership, RMC Executive Director Robert J. Bylone, Jr. said: “This is a first-of-its-kind venture that will produce major and dramatic benefits for Pennsylvania in addition to new jobs and growth for the companies directly. The new recycling venture…is expected to take at least 20 million pounds a year of plastic well pad liner material out of the waste stream and turn it into useful new products.”

For more information, visit the Joint Conservation Committee website.

1/14/2013