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<br />Future of Recycling After the <br />Market's Precipitous Plunge? <br /> <br />By Joe P. Hasler Published on: January 13, 2009 <br /> <br />For much of this decade, the value of recycled goods climbed steadily, reaching record <br />highs in mid 2008. But when the American economy collapsed, followed by international <br />markets, demand for recyclables withered. For processors now sitting on mounds of <br />material, the uestion looms: When will E~:~:~~.!:!n bounce back? <br />~:~~~~~iif:frrfj~~~~~~~~M; <br /> <br /> <br />(Photograph by Rebecca Emery/Getty Images) <br /> <br />Just a few months ago, recycled materials were moving around the globe and trading <br />But when the global economy began its death spiral in September, it took <br />recycling industry down with it. <br /> <br /> <br />Now, recyclers across the country are struggling to cope with what Jerry Powell, editor of <br />Resource Recycling magazine, estimates is a two-thirds to three-quarters drop in value <br />for recycled materials. A litany of economic factors led to the downturn. Plastics, for <br />example, lost value as the price of the petroleum used to create them dropped from $147 <br />a barrel in July to around $40 today. According to the Maine Resource Recovery Center, <br />the price of recycled polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastics subsequently plummeted <br />from $396 per ton in June to $176 per ton in December. Declining car sales also reduced <br />the demand for plastics and metals, which are used by the automotive industry. And once <br />people stopped buying other products, manufacturers in China no longer accepted <br />America's recyclables-particularly paper for all that packaging. In June, Maine's <br />newsprint sold for $121 per ton; by December that number had dropped to $21 per ton. <br />