Syracuse, N.Y. -- The global recycling crisis has arrived in Onondaga County, and it's probably going to cost you.



An upheaval in global recycling markets over the past year has the Onondaga County Resource Recovery Agency facing a deficit next year of $2.5 million. The agency is considering an increase of 10 percent or more in its major source of revenue, the fee it charges haulers to bring garbage to the incinerator in Jamesville.



Any increase is likely to passed on to residents and businesses, but it's not clear how much will come out of your pocket. That will depend upon a number of factors, including whether you pay a hauler directly or if trash collection is built into your municipality's property taxes.

"If you're hiring your own solid waste hauler, you're going to feel that directly on your bill," said Dereth Glance, OCRRA's executive director. "If it ends up falling under the property tax cap, then something else (in your municipality) isn't going to get done."

The big reason for OCRRA's looming deficit is that China, until recently the biggest market for U.S. recycled paper, has essentially stopped taking it. That led to a dramatic drop in prices paid for paper collected in recycling bins.

It also prompted Waste Management in July to cancel its contract with OCRRA to take and market recyclables. The contract limits the agency's tab for processing recyclables to $370,000 a year in down markets. Without the contract, which ends Oct. 31, OCRRA's costs could rise to $2 million or more in 2019.



While OCRRA and Waste Management negotiate a new contract, county officials say residents won't see any changes to recycling, and that the decades-old recycling program will continue.



"It is an absolute last resort to cut back on the program we have developed," said Michael Plochocki, a county legislator from Marcellus who chairs the county Legislature's Environmental Protection Committee. "We are very, very reluctant to cut back on it, and we have no plans to do so."



That will be a challenge. Paper makes up half of the county's recyclables by weight. China, last year told U.S. suppliers they had to meet stringent standards or China would stop buying. Most American recycling plants can't meet those standards, and have had to find new places to ship paper.



Prices paid for paper have plummeted. One category of paper, called sorted residential papers, sold for $104 a ton a year ago, and is now selling for $31 a ton, according to the trade publication Resource Recycling. The price for another category, mixed paper, dropped 98 percent in the same period, from $71 to $1.56 a ton.



"The value of paper, which has been bread and butter of many recycling programs, is crashing," Glance said. "We anticipate that we have not reached the bottom of the market yet. Things could get worse."

Last year, the county earned $125,000 from the sale of recyclables. This year, it will spend more than $400,000. Next year, that could rise above $2 million.



Waste Management's contract contains a clause that if prices paid for "blended recyclables" stays below $40 a ton for three straight months, the company can cancel. The third month was July, Waste Management said in a letter to OCRRA.



"China's actions have caused the domestic and worldwide markets for these types of recyclables to be significantly disrupted," the letter said. "The reduction of China markets means an oversupply of commodities to markets across the globe and a steep decline in commodity prices."



Glance said Waste Management will keep taking and processing recyclables at its Liverpool plant, but a company spokeswoman was less committal. Asked by email if Waste Management will continue to accept recyclables without a contract in place, spokeswoman Lori Caso replied: "We have every confidence that we will identify a mutually agreeable resolution and continue to serve the residents of Onondaga County with their recycling needs."



Caso said Waste Management is negotiating a new contract "that would allow recycling services to continue."



Residents, businesses and schools recycle about 185,000 tons of paper, cardboard, bottles and cans each year, OCRRA said. Onondaga County's paper had been going to China, but it's being sent to India now, Glance said. Cardboard and plastics are recycled locally, she said, and those markets remain strong.



OCRRA has few options to close its budget gap. The agency has two major sources of income: the sale of electricity generated by the burning of garbage at the Jamesville incinerator, and the "tipping fee" that haulers pay to bring garbage to the incinerator. This year's electricity revenues will be about $4.1 million. Tip fees are about seven times larger, at $28.1 million.



Electricity prices have also been spiraling downward. Several years ago, Glance said, the agency sold electricity for 6.5 cents per kilowatt. Today, the price is 1.8 cents, a drop of more than two-thirds.



That leaves the tipping fee, which is $89 per ton of garbage. Glance told county legislators that OCRRA is looking at raising that fee by $10 or more.



Private haulers would likely pass on the increase to their customers by raising rates. Things get more complicated in municipalities, including Syracuse, that fold garbage-hauling into property taxes and are bound by a state-mandated property tax cap of 2 percent.



Syracuse pays OCRRA about $3 million a year to take about 35,000 tons of garbage, said Greg Loh, director of city initiatives. A 10 percent increase in the tipping fee could cost the city $300,000 or more.



"OCRRA's board has not taken any action," Loh said in an email, "but any increase in tipping fees would be a major unanticipated cost to the city budget."



OCRRA's board of directors is working on a budget now. It will be released in October.

Glance said OCRRA said she has asked county officials for money next year to help close the budget gap, but hasn't gotten an answer yet.

Other communities in New York have taken drastic steps. Albany's principal waste hauler, Waste Connections, said this summer it will start charging customers $120 a ton for recyclables, according to the Times-Union. The city of Rensselaer will raise its garbage fees by 27 percent, the paper reported.



Glance said the prices for paper could stay low until other recycling markets, either domestic or abroad, are found to market the paper at higher prices. The long-term solution, she said, is for new paper-recycling plants to open in the United States. That could take a while, though.



"Experts are anticipating this depression in recycling could last for 12 to 24 months," Glance said.



In the meantime, the state Department of Environmental Conservation is holding meetings around the state to find solutions to the problem. At the first meeting, in late August, OCRRA recycling director Andrew Radin told state officials the recycling crisis could cost local governments up to $100 million statewide.



County residents have worked too hard and are too successful at recycling to curtail the program, Glance said. OCRRA is confident that paper markets will eventually rebound.



"The big message from Onondaga County," she said, "is now is not the time to walk away from recycling."







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