Abstract is a preferable alternative to the traditional landfilling is solid management, especially in urban areas. However, globalisation influences recycling due to volatile markets and creates unforeseeable barriers. While local authorities promote recycling, material recovery agents, solid waste manager interact at a different scales with different plans and spatial contexts. With less coordinated plans and fragmented programs at local level, performance of post-consumer recycling has been less likely to be successful through planning only at local level. The fragmentation of decision making, planning with a regional approach is in need for improving recycling performance. In North Carolina, the planning occurs at municipal level in public domain and the solid occurs at regional level involving private business, leading to a mismatch in the spatial context. By improving quality and increasing quantity of recyclables generated from households and business, embracing material recovery facility, and coordinating the solid waste management activities, planning can play an important role in the plastics recycling value chain reaching better states.

Methodology A qualitative research approach is applied to the study. The approach includes 1) information interviews from 3 academic researchers, 2 private industry consultants, 3 municipal solid waste manager, 14 owners and operators of the recycling facilities, and 2 economic development experts, 2) archival research of journal articles, news articles, website publically available database, government and organization reports, and internal reports, and 3) case study, selecting North Carolina as a base model to learn about implication of recycling to urban planning. Data collection spanned from September, 2016 to February, 2017. Further information of contacts can be found in Appendix. Acronyms

ABS acrylonitrile butadiene styrene ACC American Chemistry Council APR Association of Postconsumer Recyclers DSM Decision support models EPA The United States Environmental Protection Agency EPR extended producer responsibility HDPE high-density polyethylene LCA life cycle assessment LDPE low density polyethylene LF Landfill LLDPE linear low density polyethylene MRF materials recovery facility MSW municipal solid waste NC DEQ North Carolina Department of Environment Quality PCPP Post-consumer plastics recycling PE polyethylene PET polyethylene terephthalate PP polypropylene PS polystyrene PVC polyvinyl chloride RBAC Recycling Business Assistance Center RDF refuse derived fuel RIC Resin Identification Code SPC Sustainable Packaging Coalition UNEP United Nations Environment Program U.S. EPA United States Environmental Protection Agency WDP Waste-derived products WTE waste-to-energy

Introduction With limited landfill capacity and rapid increase in waste volume, municipal solid , especially post-consumer packaging products, have become a more urgent issue in urban areas. Attempts to divert recyclables from landfills has received a lot of attention in academic research. Due to market risks, low quality supply, and limited capacity, however, the recycling market shows unstable trends over the last several years, with plastics recycling rate significant lower than other recyclable products (Al-Salem, Lettieri & Baeyens, 2009). To accommodate sustainable solid waste management in an economically viable manner, city and regional infrastructure planning will have to take multiple spatial scales into consideration. A regional network can impact the efficiency and accessibility of individual programs through information sharing, infrastructure support, and cooperation. Taking North Carolina as a case, this study focuses on the factors influencing local and regional recycling industry, solid waste management strategies accommodating the sustainable development pattern, and the economic development opportunities. Recycling involves complex coordination between individuals, organizations, municipalities, private business, and policies influencing directly or indirectly along the value chain. Such complex system demands a regional cooperation network established through public and private efforts.

Post-Landfilling Age in North Carolina Shifting from landfilling to alternative municipal solid waste (MSW) management strategy, North Carolina has moved away from a system where local, government-operated facilities dispose of waste within county boundaries. The closure of the municipal solid waste landfills (MSWLFs) did not come as surprise: The Clean Air Act instituted in 1990 forced the closure of aged or smaller landfills that might generate pollution to neighboring communities. As a result, MSW do not usually end up in individual landfills within each solid waste management unit-usually a county. They would be sent to transfer centers where wastes from multiple counties concentrates and ended up somewhere outside the origins of the sources. On the other hand, alternative MSW management strategy attracts these solid waste management units to rethink the new spatial patterns and the consequences of keeping the wastes out of the MSWLFs. To accommodate the changing management, planning will have to rethink about the approaches to integrate the flows of wastes into the metabolism of urban living.

Figure 1 Active and Dated MSWLFs in North Carolina (Source: NC DEQ, 2016)

Figure 2 MSWLF Used by County, 2002 (Source: NC DEQ, 2015)

The limited landfilling capacity forces the solid waste departments in each county to plan for more sustainable alternatives. In North Carolina, a county is a solid waste service unit that is responsible for providing waste-related services within the county boundary. In 2014, the total remaining capacity of all North Carolina MSW landfills measures approximately 234 million tons, and the state capacity equals 31 years of waste disposal if North Carolina’s rate of landfill use remains steady at the level of 7.3 million tons per year (North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), 2015). The dynamics of economic incentives of directly disposing wastes also changed the decision-making dynamics for households and business. Currently the average tipping fee of landfilling MSW in North Carolina is about $49 per ton, while sending to recycling facilities (including material recovery facility and transfer center) is $42 per ton (NC DEQ, 2016). North Carolina are also seeing heavier burden in saving money and environment by diverting the wastes from landfills. The cost for handling solid waste management used to be offset by the revenue generated by landfills charging tipping fees. With more landfills closing up, counties without one will have to pay transfer stations or landfills locating in other counties to tip the MSW. Solid waste departments will have to divert as much MSW as they could to make the service sustainable. Yet with concentration of population and increasing per capita generation rate, the cost for some counties has becoming even burdensome. The total amount of MSW generated in North Carolina is about 9.8 million tonnes, with the average daily per capita MSW generate rate at 6.2 pounds (equivalent to 1.13 tonnes annually) in 2016, which grew five more percent from that in 1991, and exceeds the current national average level at 4.4 pounds. Plastics Complex: Low Quantity and Bad Quality Post-consumer plastics product (PCPP) waste management is especially challenging. The environmental and health impacts caused by mishandling the plastics debris is extremely high. The persistence of macro- and micro-plastic products in land and ocean pose risks to the organisms through interfering the ingestion and digestion, or entanglement (Li, Tse, and Fok, 2016). And the PVC and PC can release toxic compounds into the air, water, and soil, bringing serious environmental concerns for human beings as well (North, & Halden, 2013; Halden, 2010). There are several different types of plastics identified by the manufacturers and recycling programs have preferences on which types can be recycled and which cannot, as opposed to accepting other recycle types without differentiating the subtypes. Plastics are a wide family of resource efficient materials derived from organic products such as cellulose, coal, natural gas, salt and, of course, crude oil. The PCPP waste refers to the waste type produced by the end consumer of a plastics product and material stream. The currently classification based on the property and applications of plastics product has been used since 1988 to guide recycling. The system of classification is called resin identification code (RIC) implemented by ASTM for recycling purpose and updated in March 2015. #1 PETE: Polyethylene terephthalate, usually for beverage bottle. #2 HDPE: High density polyethylene, usually for milk jugs and recycling bins. #3 PVC: polyvinyl chloride, usually for rigid packaging #4 LDPE: Low density polyethylene, usually for plastic bags. #5 PP: Polypropylene, usually for medicine bottle or food containers. #6 PS: Polystyrene, usually for clamshells, food containers. #7 others. (ASTM International, 2013) PCPP in this study refers to all types of plastics used for packaging that appear in MSW stream.

Unlike the “recycling all or nothing” principle that is widely applied for organic, , glass, or metal products, specifications for recyclable plastics have been usually more confusing-usually the recycling programs only take part of the plastics in to recyclable supply chains while leaving the rest out. Most of recycled plastics belong to #1 PETE bottles, #2 HDPE containers, #4 LDPE plastic bags, and #5 PP bottles and containers. The rest types of plastics consist a relative smaller part of recycled resins or plastics. And programs tend to only accept specific types of plastics based on the demand from lower stream along the supply chain, adding difficulties to sorting within household for complex packing products. Residents who are not aware of the type of plastics may not recycle the “correct” type required by the recycling program, or just dump the recyclables into dumpsters as non-recyclables. The total amount of the plastics waste generated in 2014 in the U.S. was 33.5 million tons, which accounted for 12.8 percent of the total waste generated (258 million tons) (U.S. EPA, 2015) (Figure 3). The recycled plastics takes only about eight percent of the total plastics waste generated, which is 33 million tons (U.S. EPA, 2015) (Figure 4, Figure 5). In North Carolina, approximately 10.4 percent of the total MSW came from plastics in weight, leading to about one million tonnes of plastics waste in total (NC DEQ, n.d.). Since plastic products are usually of low weight-to-volume ratio, it can generate 55 cubic yard per ton as opposed to around 4 cubic yard/ton of paper, and 3 cubic yard/ton for glass (United States Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA), n.d.), which makes plastics waste dominant in volume of total waste generated, and potentially taking up a lot of spaces in landfills. The projected volume of plastics needs for recycling will increase rapidly with significant structure change due to policy changes. Since 2009, when North Carolina’s disposal ban on plastic bottles became effective, PET plastic bottle recovery has experienced significant growth, while the rest hasn’t seen any significant increase. In the annual report of 2014, plastic bottles made of PET and HDPE consists nearly 87 percent of the public plastics recovery. Other types of plastics, such as PP and PS, have only been accepted in a handful of places, and not available to all local recycling programs. On average, only about 4% of PCPP wastes are being recycled from MSW with varying levels of recovery of different types. This also echoes the problem of fragmentation of solid waste management programs that would ultimately lead to under-performed PCPP recycling outcomes.

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Figure 4 Percentage of recovered to the total amount of waste 1960-2013 (Source: EPA, 2015)

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Figure 5 Amount of plastics waste generated and recovered 1960-2013 (Source: EPA, 2015) Program Fragmentation: Supply Doesn’t Meet Demand Recycling programs of MSW are programs operated by public or private sectors on their own or outsourcing to contractors. Services include collection of the recyclables from the residents or organizations, either from curbside recycling or drop-off recycling programs that recyclables from residents or organizations in the service areas. According to the interview with staff working in solid waste department in Orange County, North Carolina, individuals living in the service area may be automatically enrolled in the local recycling program whichever he/she is eligible, or opt-in for service with additional fee at a fixed or flexible rate, depending on local ordinance provisions. With the customized subscription of services over a certain period, households and business can dump recyclables in the carts or bins provided by the service provider, either municipal employees or commercial contractors. For example, all multi-family housing units in Orange County, North Carolina are currently mandated to participate in recycling programs. Residents living in these units will automatically subscribe for the MSW recycling service provided by Orange County Solid Waste Management upon the time of moving in. Apartment complexes might also contract private companies for different type of recyclables that would not be collected by local MSW department, such as corrugated cardboard, depending on their own need. The service providers usually have specifications on the type of materials that they will accept as recyclables based on their programming. The recyclables and wastes can be collected in a mixed manner (single stream) or separated manner (dual or multiple stream). Within the recycling programs, there might be different provision for different types of households, organizations, and business. This may impose extra burden on the end users of the services to make it clear of who are allowed to recycle what in which bins. In the case of mixed-use areas, the confusion may lead to a weak recycling performance when rules for different type of residence or business do not accommodate with one another well. According to one solid waste planner, a high-rise building in downtown area with restaurants, retail stores, offices and residential units will have to subscribe separate services because the program taking care of multi-family units do not cover restaurant type of business, while companies occupying the offices may contract a different hauler from the rest units. With multiple services providers, multiple set of rules, different colors of bins in different places, it can impede the effort to make recycling work in such space. In addition to a variety of types of programming, the quality of recyclables can vary even within a single program over a certain period. It might be caused by the difference in convenience, style of visual signs, cleanness of the sites of recycling among the customers. The performance could also vary across time, with changing individual behaviors or the population itself. The unstable performance would lead to unstable supply of the recyclables, including PCPP wastes. In a centralized study of plastics recycling programs over 2,000 communities representing more than 50% of the U.S. population, the availability of materials ranges from 1% to 92% (Sustainable Packing Institute, American Chemistry Council, 2016). For instance, 92% of the residents can HDPE bottles through the HDPE programs, while less than 62% PP clamshells are recycled (Sustainable Packing Institute, American Chemistry Council, 2016). Recycling programs also vary in the explicit requirements of which specific types of plastics can be accepted, and which cannot. Some of the programs do not explicitly prohibit some certain types of PCPP, while others having a changing attitude based on contracts (Sustainable Packing Institute, American Chemistry Council, 2016). With varied recycling programs changing over time, new movers or visitors from other regions in the States may be confused about recycling rules, and the same household members could find it difficult to adapt to new rules to do the proper recycling. Coupled with factors influencing the level of convenience and clarity of instructions, it is reasonable that recycling performance is disappointing to most of the solid waste management units (Sustainable Packing Institute, American Chemistry Council, 2016). Volatile Market Decides The fragmentation of recycling programs could be a consequence of adapting to volatile PCPP recyclable markets at local, regional, national, and international level. During the past decade, major consumers purchasing recycled plastics have been other countries which makes domestic markets mainly focusing on pre-processing and shipping, which cost way more than re-processing domestically. China, the largest consumer, has consumed more than 50 percent of the plastic , which were often poorly sorted and impure bales of plastics, exported from U.S. in 2012, valued more than $560 million (Chen, J., 2013). Shipments of plastics to China totaled 97,000 Twenty-foot Equivalent (TEU), or 4.9 million cubic yard in 2012 (“US scrap exports to china losing their luster?”, 2013). Exporting the low-quality recycled plastics to other countries in the international trade has also long been a “cheap and convenient” choice for developed countries to balance the deficit in international trade as well as saving landfill spaces. The international market, however, faces an uncertain environment in the global market for recycled plastics. When the environmental policy in developing countries-the destination of low-quality plastic scraps-explicitly banning the commodity from entering the borderlines, it would be very difficult for the low-quality plastic scraps to find a convenient place inside the U.S. without poor recycling effort. The “Green Fence” operation initiated in 2013 in Mainland China had directly led to 11% decrease in the scrap plastics exports from the US in the very same year, with increasing preferences on clean plastics scraps such as HDPE or LDPE (Figure 6, Figure 7, Figure 8). The scrap plastics will have to stay domestically, either ending up in MSWLF, WTE or recycled. Heavily dependent on the international trade to manage the PCPP waste, domestic markets have yet grown large enough to capture the gaps. Some experts argued that there was basically no recycling of low-quality plastics collected in the U.S. after China turns these scraps away since “Green Fence” operation.

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Figure 6 Plastic Scrap Export from 2002-2016, US Total and China, HS code 3915 (Waste, Parings and Scrap, of Plastics) Values in 2017 USD. (Source: U.S. Census Bureau: Economic Indicators Division USA Trade Online. Source: U.S. Import and Export Merchandise trade statistics.) 1200

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Figure 8 Percentage of Plastic Scrap Subtypes Exported to China from 2002-2016 Values in 2017 USD (Source: U.S. Census Bureau: Economic Indicators Division USA Trade Online. Source: U.S. Import and Export Merchandise trade statistics.)

Cultivating a strong domestic market for PCPP would be of crucial importance, and by improving the scrap quality, it could be more competitive for the recycled PCPPs than the virgin materials. Currently there are approximately 200 regional commodity exchanges operation in North America serving for specific materials or specific regions, with a variety of transaction fees structures. In North Carolina, there is a regional recyclable exchange, NCWasteTrader1 and a recyclable product-specific market directory North Carolina Recycling Market Directory2. The regional market for PCPP plays an important role of matching purchasing and supply information to facilitate inter-state transactions. State policy differences would affect such activities, and the economic development plans

1 http://www.ncwastetrader.org/

2 http://www.p2pays.org/dmrm/start.aspx supporting the recycling industry could have been influence other states. How can we improve the quality of PCPP waste so that it can be sustainable business in international and regional markets? The quality of waste-derived products (WDP) determines the popularity of the recycled materials in the market. The level of acceptance, reliability of the sources, and legislation on quality control can help in reducing market risks when consumers of the recycled materials are concerned about the quality. The application of innovative technologies inside existing recycling layouts can increase the capacity in transporting and processing of the recycled materials, and control the overall quality of the products. Processing large amount of mixed wastes depends highly on the sortation technology, which evolves and improves since 1970s and has increase diversion rate and quantity of recyclables (Gershman, Brickner & Bratton, Inc., 2015). Flotation will be able to separate light-weighted materials from heavy ones that cannot float in water. Optical near infrared light and sensors have improved the efficiency in recognize different types of plastics and separate them by resin types. The automation of the process can reduce the cost and increase the economic value for the recyclables, which can make the recycled material relatively more competitive than virgin resins (Rogoff & Clark, 2016; Gershman, Brickner & Bratton, Inc., 2015). Barriers still exist for the system to reach its optimal productivity. The services available strongly rely on the infrastructures capability, and the integration of such infrastructures in urban settings needs to be efficient, profitable, and accessible. And to make the services available, we need adequate planning support that can help build the facility and infrastructures demanded by the recycling value chain, identify the economic opportunities in local economy growth, and resolve the potential conflicts during the plan making and implementation. With growing and concentrating population and steady individual level of waste generation, urban areas may see ever more challenges in recycling over the past decades. Solid waste management, including recycling, can be well supported through building a regional recycling network as suggested by the theory describing urban dynamics. In North Carolina, however, the city planning and solid waste management seem to integrate at minimum level, leaving the planning body unable to take care of solid waste management holistically, and solid waste management failing to properly implement plans as it planned. Theories of Urban Metabolism, Economics, and Growth The theory of urban metabolism suggests that planning for sustainable urban development needs to take the natural resource flow into consideration, which inspires studies in urban mining that aimed at support material recovery from urban wastes. According to Kennedy, Pincetl, and Bunje, two non-conflicting streams has emerged ever since 1970s, studying the energy and mass flow within the urban contexts (Kennedy, Pincetl, and Bunje, 2011). By analyzing the input and output of the activities in the urban area, researchers have long recognized the role of urban planning and designing in sustaining the “healthy” living in urban areas (Kennedy, Pincetl, and Bunje, 2011, Chrysoulakis et al., 2013, Gandy, 2004). Recycling industry in North Carolina inevitably involves with closing the urban mass loop by feeding the urban system with materials that was generated as wastes. Multiple researchers have been trying to tackle the issue through the lens of solid waste management economics. Seeing MSW not as a government responsibility but a plain commodity that can be traded through network, recycling services would be regarded as a part in the supply chain formed by public and private entities. And the consumers, or individuals, became the raw material providers in the business. Some economists embraced the neoliberal approach asking for government policies that gave more priority to private development starting in 1980s in developed countries (McCarthy, 2004; Peck and Tickell, 2002). With proper industry policy and guidance to support private companies trading the commodity within the value chain, neoliberalism provided an umbrella for the thriving of local business as well as service chains across the states. Driven by the profit rather than the ecological awareness, the stakeholder in the industry would be strongly affected by political, social, and economic factors. As long as any activities can increase the value in the recyclables, it would worth trading and add on to current local business. Due to the nature of being labor intensive, the recycling economy has become one of the largest employment sectors including formal and informal business (International Waste Management Association, 2012). Recycling industry will not only close the loop of a circular economy in a proper spatial scale, but also provide economic development windows for areas that generate profitable MSW. In supporting the industry, some policies outperform others when the degree of commitment can properly reflect the motivations. In the framework of political economy, government policies can determine the transaction costs within the impact zones. As discussed by Deslatte and Swann, when a policy targets at goals of sustainability, the more confined policy is, the less efficient it will be (Deslatte and Swann, 2016). Yet, if a policy can successfully differentiate different stakeholder types and aggregate the policy demand by groups, the outcomes will be much more likely to be predictable (Deslatte and Swann, 2016). Infrastructure Planning, a Rudimental Support Public and private sectors have different focus in participating in the value chain of plastics recycling, with local government having the power of conducting and implementing land use, infrastructure, and municipal service plans while the private companies being influenced by them. They complement each other by bringing different but necessary resources to the industry, however, and this allows for a more robust system facing volatile markets. Synthesizing the information provided by interview participants, there can be three levels of effort that can integrate the goal of sustainable solid waste management in city planning. At micro level, ensuring the storage space for recycling at project level provide the feasibility for recycling program in the first tier. At the meso level, the land use and building standards need to be enforced to protect the surrounding communities from being negatively impacted. At macro level, it is essential to make sure that the mutual stewardship can be established. The plan at macro level will layout the availability of resources for the stakeholders in the value chain. This is ensured by making plans for the designated service areas. If the service area contains multiple local planning bodies, then it would be very difficult for a local plan to coordinate well in supporting the services. A county or a municipality is usually the atom unit of an integrated MSW service, either through employing workers or outsourcing to private companies. There are 100 counties, one reservation, and 522 cities, towns, and villages in North Carolina. Since the MSW planning usually occur within the county or a municipality, the planners will need to accommodate the anticipated growth of population in size, spatial distribution, and characteristics in their service areas. As a result, when planning for sustainable development, planners should take the capacity of MSW management into account. The motivation of planning and installing such facility, however, cannot be planned in the domestic municipality, or county. According to NC General Statute 130A Article 9 Solid Waste Management, DEQ maintains a Division of Waste Management to monitor and supervise local government units to implementing a permitted solid waste management facility, including treatment and processing facility serving recycling, “in a specific geographic area in accordance with a solid waste management plan”, where a unit of local government refers to a county, municipality, or incorporated village. (G.S. 130A-291(a)). Solid waste programs, as required by North Carolina General Statute, occurs at unit of local government level, and usually operated by counties instead of municipalities. More than two units of local government can form a regional solid waste management authority under the provision in General Statutes Chapter 153A (G.S. 153A-421). If such a regional solid waste management authority has been established, it can provide management as a whole and plan jointly for infrastructure serving the area. By designating a geographic area or delegating the authority to the local government units to perform solid waste management within the jurisdictional area. Jurisdictional areas refer to the city or county corporate limits, according to Article 19 Planning and Regulation of Development (G.S. 160A-360(a)). Both cities and counties were empowered to use new planning tools and became more active in planning. The planning boundary between municipalities and counties, however, should not overlap. And if a county hadn’t adopted certain planning programs, then municipalities could enjoy the power of planning outside is city limits. The planning jurisdictions of counties and municipalities do not overlap, but the planning power of public enterprise, including solid waste management, can be exercised at county level and adopted and approved by municipalities enjoying the services (G.S. 160A-311(6)). Counties, on the other hand, may regulate solid waste programs in and outside municipal limits when approved by the municipality authorities. Therefore, counties, the provider of solid waste management programs, and municipalities both have power of planning for the recycling facilities within their own boundary that do not overlap with one another. At regional level, a solid waste management authority could have the power of planning for infrastructure for multiple counties. The intermediate layer of recyclable processing and transferring infrastructures closes the loop from consumers to manufactures or energy generators by receiving feedstock collected through local recycling programs and selling the processed materials in recyclable market. In determining the serving area and processing capacity, planning plays an important role in the resulting quantity and quality of the recyclables to meet the ever- upgrading demand from the markets. Taking the “Green Fence Initiative” as an example, China would only accept clean baled plastics while refusing the dirty mixed bales entering the border, which is about 30 million tonnes per year since 2013. If a MRF cannot produce the clean bales, it is likely for the MRF live with the thin margin unless the capacity is being upgraded. As upgrading the equipment at MRFs or WTEs would be high, it is crucial that planners can take actions to reduce the risks and support the growth. Planning for a Closed Loop with Material Recovery Facilities The meso level of urban planning support recycling through proper land allocation for the infrastructures. Through land use and environmental planning, public and private facilities that process recyclables can coordinate with other stakeholders along the value chain in their potential service areas. Landfills have been explicitly discussed in local, regional, or state plan-making process in North Carolina, while recycling related facilities tend to be less frequently mentioned. Solid waste planners in North Carolina speak highly such facilities, and consultants encourage incorporating such facilities in a more formalized manner. And there is a gap at the meso level to achieve better coordination between public and private sectors. A material recovery facility (MRF) can receive MSW feedstocks collected from local solid waste programs as a MSWLF, and output baled or pelleted resins that could be purchased by consumers in the recycled material market. The acceptance of MSW in local recycling programs has been confined by the capability of the downstream buyers-usually transfer centers and material recovery facilities, including the type of materials and processing capacity. It is the end market that defines how much and in what format these MSW are demanded. The higher requirement of the product quality challenged the municipalities and MRFs in terms of the adjusting workflows to improve productivity and adapt to the markets.

Figure 9 MRF Annual Revenue (Source: Federal Reserve Bank, 2016)

Despite the environmental benefits from diverting wastes from ending up in landfills, MRFs actually seeks economically viable market performance and expect stable profit. The revenue determines how contract is made between local recycling programs and private contractors. And it is being confined by the efficiency and processing capacity of equipment and corresponding workflows. The workflow and designed capacity varies among MRFs of different equipment and target service area. MRFs receiving single-stream MSW, or dirty MRFs, might take in large amount of MSW but only produce a relatively small quantity of final products, while dual stream MRFs, or clean MRFs, may only take small amount of specific type of MSW but have high output-to-input ratio. Dual stream MRFs require residents to separate plastics containers, metal, glass and paper at source, and the local recycling program will accommodate such workflow with multiple-stream collection. As the accepted materials have expanded to new types, it isn’t always well understood to by residents in which recycle bins they should be dumping. For MRFs, it is more difficult to sort these containers from the paper stream than it is from the container stream, making this a real obstacle. Due to the complexity of sorting at source, single stream recycling programs are much more favorable: even when a typical single-stream facility costs $8 million to $10 million, more than double the price of a dual-stream facility, a trend of declining of dual-stream MRFs can still be observed (Gershman, Brickner & Bratton, Inc., 2015). While single stream systems allow for easier communication and simple behavior, the difficulty in separating the materials within MRFs has imposed challenges to non-interrupted workflow, accuracy of screening and sorting, and proper handling. Given the general prospect of market performance, the target service area and characteristics of the estimated annual MSW generation could play an important role in determining which type of MRF will be invested in. Building, operating, and maintenance of a MRF demands high commitment at different stages in the lifecycle. Publicly owned or leased MRFs could save the local government’s cost on total tipping fees, while private owned MRF might engage in a larger regional scheme of MSW trading with less market risks. Local government who chooses to own and operate a MRF won’t have to pay for the tipping fees when receiving local waste feedstocks while receiving tipping fees from other recycling programs contracting with the MRF to offset the operation and maintenance cost. And when outsourcing the service to private-owned MRFs, the market risks in revenue and costs would be less likely to affect the department-wise budget.

Figure 10 Single-Stream MRF Workflow (Source: Franchetti, 2012)

Figure 11 Dual-Stream MRF Workflow (Source: Franchetti, 2012)

The key factors of the productivity of MRF includes equipment design, operation, maintenance, and waste quality. Hence, the interaction between MRF and local recycling programs determines the performance of the recycling programs serving the municipalities. As indicated in the MRF Material Workflow Study in 2015 by Resource Recycling Society, the different characteristics of the material in the MSW mixture could lead to different level of loss rate of plastics materials, ranging from 5% to 30%, which is sorted based on weight, size, shape, color, and residuals attached to the waste (Resource Recycling Society, 2015). The main takeaways for owner and operator of the MRFs is to communicate with the local solid waste management programs with the types of materials of interests and the preservation of the specific characteristics of such material in order to improve the sustainability of the industry. And the local trend of waste generation and recycling interests can also be interpreted into market value prospects for the MRF serving the communities in the area. Currently, there are eleven single stream MRFs and eight dual stream MRF in North Carolina listed in NC DEQ website. These facilities are listed as 118 permitted transfer stations and treatment and processing facilities. The largest MRFs tend to concentrate in metropolitan areas such as Raleigh-Durham, Charlotte, and Greensboro. Serving multiple counties other than the very county where they located, the MRFs collect and process the waste coming from different recycling programs maintained separately by local solid waste department and transfer centers that aggregate MSW hauled from multiple sources. And the cooperation between local departments, transfer centers, and MRFs tends to be relatively stable based on contracts. Local departments without MRFs will tip the MSW to the transfer center to minimize the hauling cost and tipping cost. With relatively small divergences in the tipping fee schedules, the cost of transportation would be of more weight when determining the destinations of MSW hauling. Generally speaking, the MRF which is of the most proximity to the upper stream sources will be the top choice.

Figure 12 Material Recovery Facility Map in North Carolina (dot: dual stream MRFs, square: single-stream MRFs) (Source: NC DEQ, n.d.) Planning for Recycling Space and Activity The micro level that urban planning can intervene is that implementing ordinance and enforcing building design standards to ensure enough recycling services can be delivered to each of the households, organizations, and business. Through provisions in local ordinance and building codes relevant to solid waste management and recycling, storage spaces, transporting routes, and working zones of staff can be ensured. And the rules are usually executed within the municipality service boundaries with little interference from other planning bodies. The provisions of planning for recycling spaces in local ordinance usually set up rules of where the mobile carts for recycling can be set and where not, without detailed space design specification. This practice will grant flexibility in decision making during place making process or actual use. Property owners or tenants can decide where the cart would be according to their plans. While for some type of buildings, such as apartment complexes and office building where the spaces tend to be fixed over a long period, these rules might not lead to clear expectations of the actual usage or functions of the recycling areas. And it would depend on the building codes and inspection rules that determines whether the recycling spaces are adequate or not. Without clear design before actual use, however, the gap in the requirement may lead up to confusions and unwanted consequence that is hard to be changed. The specification, such as how the space is allocated in multi-story building, the design of collection area to facilitate the pick-up work, blending into surrounding areas to generate minimal impact, buffer space to store extra recyclables, and so on. The provisions usually specify the conditions for locating recycling facilities in a manner that generates the minimal impact for the tenants and owners of the properties nearby. Although the local zoning ordinance may explicitly require the space dedicated for recycling carts in relevant land use types and building types, the extent that such provisions can support recycling is still under questioning. According to one of the solid waste planners, mixed-use type might often cause some complexities to property managers, residents, and service providers. Without clear boundary on “who should dump what in which cart”, the services may simply end up in conflicts and tensions between the property managers, haulers, and the solid waste authority. For example, a mixed-use building with more than 50 units in residential, commercial, and office types. The would be of a lot different than that in a neighborhood of 50 single family housing units. Unloading the recyclable bins or carts could impose some difficulties in handling the waste, and the lack of clarity in ownerships of the carts can lead to recyclables of lower quality. Not only concentration of population and activities lead to the increase in volume generated, but also the level of complexity in management. The potential complexity in behavioral changes within different types of land use would also add extra difficulties to solving the recycling problem. According to the interview with Blair Pollock, the solid waste planner in Orange County North Carolina, solid waste management plans usually do not directly include any facility siting plans, while the local land use plans do not mention how to accommodate recycling. In the US, and particularly in North Carolina, for better or worse, decisions about the provisions of recycling services are made on the local level. The lack of coordination at the whole area influenced by recycling value chain could impede the system perform at its optimal level. For instance, one reason that the plastics diversion rate varies among different resin types across North Carolina is that some counties only accept type 2, 4, and 5 while others accept all types. And for MRFs serving multiple counties, it is crucial to standardize the input waste feedstocks meeting the processing capacity. Such fragmented decision making systems would led to different diversion rate by plastics types, which also limits the supplies in the recyclable market. To coordinate the effort in public and private sectors in North Carolina, the State Department of Environment Quality promote Best Management Practices for public recycling programs, and also uses grant funding to incentivize public programs to adopt these practices. If the specification in zoning ordinance is too general, while the building code is to specific, it would be helpful to bridge the gap by designing guide. Together with incentive programs, the availability of recycling space can be secured. Private Sectors in the Value Chain Private establishments have also contributed in completing the service network, with much more flexibility in choice of markets and locations of interests, impacting the recycling industry and solid waste management performance in a larger scale. North Carolina is said to have a very strong infrastructure, with companies like Clear Path, Unifi, Envision, Wellmark, and Fiberon. In 2015, Unifi’s PET bottle processing facility opened in Reidsville with a $28 million capital investment and capacity of processing 2 billion bottles per year and producing 75 million pounds of flake annually. The operation allows Unifi to directly source PET bales from MRFs nearby, complementing and supporting the company’s PET recycled contents. As estimated by Recycling Business Assistance Center, there are about 712 private companies active in the Regional Recycling Market Directory in North Carolina, and about 538 of them recycle plastics. Paramount to the level in 2013, there are about 17,000 direct employees in recycling related industry, contributing a total of $442 million in payrolls (Recycling Business Assistance Center, 2013). More specifically, an initiative, “Your Bottle Means Jobs”, to promote plastics in the North Carolina and South Carolina, has estimated that for every two more PET bottle of good quality being recycled among all residents in the two states every week, 300 more jobs will be created along the value chain in the industry3. This calculation assumes that the domestic market has been established and well functioned. When market condition improves, private business will have better chance in profit through expansion. In other words, recyclable material purchasers prefer recyclables of good quality and in large quantity to reach economy of scales, and the quality and quantity could be strongly influenced by the quality of recyclables diverted from MSW. The key to close the loop is the intermediate layer of material recovery facilities. Spatial Mismatch in Plan Making and Implementation Locating in a specific jurisdiction of local government, the planning of regional recycling infrastructure might not be prioritized by municipality which doesn’t run its own MSW program. Recycling facilities maximizing profits tend to site in the areas with highest cost- effectiveness. The county-MRF relationship can be established through contracts and deals, so that the MRFs and counties can specify their shares in profit of selling the recyclables, or counties tipping MRFs first and get shares later, or simply reimburse MRFs for disposing, as practiced by Orange County, North Carolina. Such scheme can incentivize counties to collaborate with MRFs in making a recycling-supportive plan with dedicated resources to implement it. The revenue of MRF comes from the recovered recyclables sold to downstream buyers, to offset the operation costs, including recyclable material buying, hauling, processing, and disposing the rest MSW to MSWLFs. Without subsidies or tax exemption, MRF might not be competitive enough compared with MSWLFs, and the choice of recycling might not be economically favorable among counties. The strong attachment to MSW generation center makes the recycling economy very local and spatially fixed. The profitability, although strongly shaped by international market changes, could still be smoothed if a buffer build by MRF and WTE facilities can be built while preventing the MSW entering the MSWLFs. The controversy over locating MRFs is at minimum level, according to the managers of the facilities. Residents and the municipalities both respond to transfer and processing MRFs much more positively than traditional landfills. Among the 19 MRFs in NC, fourteen have been contacted, and the most managers of which have indicated the potential expansion in capacity once the municipalities see more demand. Generating less controversy in environmental justice, adding jobs and payrolls, and support sustainable solid waste management in the municipalities. Fourteen out of 19 MRFs contacts indicate a plan for expansion in capacity and service areas, which has been widely welcome by residents. Because large MRFs require significant capital expenses in material handling equipment and staff, these facilities do tend to cluster around major population centers, in order to maximize efficiency and economies of scale. Such pattern utilizes a “Hub and Spoke” model of consolidating recyclables in smaller communities and transporting them to a MRF for processing provides a solution to an otherwise decentralized generation of recyclable materials. The lack of discussion over regional recycling plans has led to a lack of attention of recycling in local plans. Due to the fact that most of the MSWs and recyclables collected

3 http://yourbottlemeansjobs.com/individuals/ locally will be transported to other counties with the capacity of handling, local planning hardly takes a proactive approach in promoting recycling. Without enough leverages on planning for activities outside the MSW’s own planning boundary. And if the service providers can coordinate the planning bodies within the services areas, it is likely that a comprehensive regional solid waste plan will take place to help solving the spatial mismatch problem. With very little concerns of the impact to environment compared with landfills, it is also mentioned by the MRF owners and solid waste planners that the “win-win” relationship between municipalities and facilities could be sustainable through better communication channels. It is unlikely that private business will be directly included in the local land use plans, and it could be hard for the planners at local municipalities to figure out where does the wastes fit in the future plan. The lack of information flow between the stakeholders is one of the negative consequence from the spatial mismatch. The fact that municipalities tend to overlook the outflow of the wastes has left the state the responsibility to handle them. But without regional infrastructure plans, there will be a lack of comprehensive assessment and systematic support of the regional capacity in material recovery, not to mention the comprehensive plan to upgrade to accommodate the planned development. Leveraging the Power of Planning Urban planning can support recycling at three spatial scales: micro level, where the availability of recycling space and activities is secured, meso level, where adequate facilities closing up the loops from consumers to producers can coordinate with other stakeholders, and macro level, where a holistic spatial structure can be built through planning. The spatial mismatch between the recycling service areas and planning boundaries may lead to the lack of coordination between plan making and implementation. At macro level, a comprehensive plan involving consideration of economic development opportunities, land use planning, environmental justice, and infrastructure network can support recycling within a region. Most of the effort in promoting recycling has been separated from urban planning policies and confined only within the solid waste program management which is being executed at local governments’ decree. The policies supporting the development of recycling business may nevertheless adapt to the market performance of the recyclables, and such adaptation demand coordinated effort from public sectors and private sectors. The mutual stewardship between stakeholders involve interactions in plan making and implementation. And it is crucial to consolidate the effort within the region. The solid waste management plan in North Carolina may need to integrate land use and environmental planning elements that may occur in each county, and prioritize areas with higher concentration of population and activities as well as work forces and market opportunities. At meso level, infrastructure planning at should be taken among multiple counties sharing the same recyclable market. MRFs with stable supplies and attractive markets can and will bring stable revenues to the municipalities and saving the costs of tipping wastes in landfills. The “win-win” relationship between MRF and recycling programs could be reinforced through a joint plan where economic benefits, costs, and risks can be reasonably shared. By including private part of the value chains into the program design, it would be less likely for solid waste programs to be fragmented. The public-private participation will improve the solid waste programming in accordance to the processing capacity and workflow at MRFs. And with reliable predictions of potential recyclable supplies, MRFs can adjust the plan for capacity upgrading or expansion. There are some barriers in achieving collaboration at the meso level. If multiple counties and MRFs were to participate in a region-wide plan making process, it might be hard to achieve mutual agreement in cost and revenue sharing schemes, or unified plan implementation that occurs at local level with heterogeneous zoning ordinances. If a region-wide recycling service and infrastructure plan were to be made, it will need a common policy framework while allowing for flexibility. Recycling services are provided at county or equivalent level, while the land use plan usually occurs at municipal level, which doesn’t cover the whole county. And for counties with multiple plan making bodies, it is highly likely that these plans will be made individually while leaving the county-wide service in pieces. In such case, plan-making within each municipality cannot take enough stakeholders related with the recycling services enjoyed by the municipality into consideration, especially when some of them locate outside the planning boundary or even the county boundary. The potential regional network approach could be helpful in tune in the spatial scales. A land use and environment plan for county level recycling services demands for coordination among municipalities and the county that has the planning capacity. And it might also generate extra burden on the planning bodies to make the support for recycling services sustainable in coordination with other municipalities when lacking a unified policy framework. Planners can play an important role as liaisons to elected officials and decision makers. They have an opportunity to highlight the many benefits that recycling can bring to an area, such as job growth, preservation of or less reliance on landfills, reductions in GHG emissions, feedstock for other local manufacturers. Additionally, encouraging a three-way partnership between city/regional planners, local economic developers and recycling specialists could yield an ongoing collaboration geared towards spotlighting the economic benefit of recycling community infrastructure investments that encourage easy recycling while attracting new businesses and residents. Summary Recycling of such materials has been a favorable alternative to landfilling in terms of environment and resource protection benefit, but the value cannot be realized unless it is also an economically viable choice for the residents and service providers. Individual recycling programs has clearly-defined spatial boundaries to provide services for residents, but the material flows and processing activities usually occur at a regional level because of the closing of local landfills, availability of long-distance hauling, and threshold to survive for specialized facilities. With less coordinated plans and fragmented programs at local level, performance of post-consumer plastics recycling has been less likely to be successful through planning only at local level. Taking North Carolina as an example, the general waste stream recycling illustrates the idea of mismatch of recycling program planning, recycling facility coordination, and city planning in regional model. Both public sectors and private business involved in the recycling industry have been influence by the micro-, meso-, and macro-level planning. And one will have to take a planning approach that takes the regional impact and factors into consideration. Reference

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Appendix A Information interviews from 3 academic researchers, 2 private industry consultants, 3 municipal solid waste managers, 14 owners and operators of the recycling facilities, and 2 economic development experts. To collect opinions on the general perspectives of how urban planning can improve plastics recycling, I request contact information from Blair for the qualified experts in plastics recycling industry or research. To obtain a better knowledge of recycling policy, I contacted Wendy Worley for information sources from NC DEQ. Private sector participation information is collected through MRF owners or manager, who are contacted through the contact list provided on NC DEQ’s website. Interviews are conducted between October 2016 to February 2017 through in-person interview, phone calls, and email corresponses. Blair Pollock, Solid Waste Planner, Orange County Solid Waste Management Kara Pochiro, Communications Director, The Association of Plastic Recyclers, Anderson, South Carolina Rebecca McGillicuddy, Outreach Expert of Resource Recycling Nina Butler, Plastic Recycling Expert, Moore Recycling Association Patty Moore, CEO and Founder of Moore Recycling Association Dr. Bonnie Monteleone, UNC Wilmington, Professor in Department of Marine Science Rob Taylor, Rob Taylor, Local Government Assistance Team Leader, North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Wendy Worley, Manager of Recycling Business Assistance Center of North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality Owners and operators of the MRFs located in North Carolina Ron Cobb, Environmental Manager Miguel Quezada, Plant Manager Jerry White, Operations Manager Terry Feeny, Plant Manager Kenny King, Regional Manager LaDonna Bolton, Site Manager Susan Daughtry, Marketing Director Jeff Miller, Owner Ned Summersill, Manager Steve Swaim, Recycling Coordinator Melanie Bruton, Environmental Programs Coordinator Stephen King, Solid Waste Director Organizations contacted through emails: Association of Plastics Recyclers Plastics Recycling Update Plastics News Moore Recycling Plastics Division of ISRI (Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries) Verity, Randleman NC American Chemistry Council Unifi, manufacturer of Repreve Fabric from the old PET bottles YourBottleMeansJob, Nongovernment Organization

Appendix B Research questions and interview questions: 1. What are the key factors influencing PCPP waste management? This research question explores the opinions of interviewee regarding the factors influencing successful plastics recycling, and what factors can urban planning influence. 1) What are the factors influencing the demand of PCPP? 2) How do these factors impact the PCPP market? 3) How do you perceive recycling behavior influence the PCPP industry? 4) How do you perceive the role of municipality in PCPP industry? 5) What are the trends in the factors or the way they impacting PCPP market? 2. What are the strategies for PCPP waste management? The research question explores the strategies and options in PCPP waste management that could potentially be improved through urban planning supports. 6) To your knowledge, what has been done to promote PCPP recycling by your organization/municipalities? 7) What are the benefits or concerns of the strategies? 8) What changes that you anticipate will change the strategies? 9) What would the strategy impact on municipality management and planning? 3. What is the current situation of recycling planning in North Carolina? The research question focuses on the current situation in North Carolina. 10) How is the recycling program being planned and implemented? 11) What could be changed to improve recycling from perspectives of planning 4. What are the potential strategies to North Carolina to reach the waste management goals The research question explores specific urban planning strategies that have been proved or have the potential to be applied to improve PCPP recycling. 12) To your knowledge, what has been identified as the best practices in recycling 13) How applicable is that strategy? 14) How would you recommend implement such strategy?