HARTSVILLE, S.C., Dec 21, 2009 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Sonoco Recycling, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Sonoco (NYSE: SON),
has been awarded a two-year contract to haul, sort and recycle
residential and commercial materials for the City of Durham. The
contract with Durham brings the number of municipalities served by
Sonoco Recycling in the area to 13.
Ted Voorhees, deputy city manager of Durham, said the city doesn't own
or operate its own sorting plant, and therefore needed to find a
contractor that could handle hauling and preparing recycled materials
for resale.
"At the end of the day, Sonoco Recycling can provide all of the services
we need, plus they are able to make assurances that they can handle
Durham's recycling at no cost and no risk to the city," Voorhees
explained. "They also have a proven track record for successfully
working with municipalities and processing large volumes of materials."
Marcy Thompson, division vice president and general manager, Sonoco
Recycling, said the relationship between Sonoco and the City of Durham
goes beyond the recycling of materials. "We have made a significant
commitment to the city, and we plan to integrate ourselves into the
community through a number of outreach initiatives, including public
education programs and partnerships with local elementary schools. We
also have plans for a number of recycling events for the community that
target various types of paper and e-waste," said Thompson, noting that
materials collected from the city will be delivered to Sonoco's
recycling facility in Durham before being transported to the Company's
full-scale materials recovery facility (MRF) in Raleigh.
Sonoco Recycling's MRF accepts and processes corrugated boxes and other
grades of paper as well as metals, plastics and glass. Sonoco, which
processes and uses many of these recycled materials to produce recycled
paperboard at its paper mills in the Southeast, utilizes most of that
paperboard to produce new consumer and industrial packaging, making
Sonoco one of the few cradle-to-cradle suppliers of packaging in the
industry. The remaining paperboard and other commodities are sold to
third parties.
Annually, Sonoco collects and processes about 3 million tons of
recyclable materials globally and has a team of recycling professionals,
many of whom are experts in waste management and manufacturing process
improvement. Sonoco is also an exporter of recycled fiber, primarily to
Asian markets.
About Sonoco
Founded in 1899, Sonoco (NYSE: SON) is a $4.1 billion global
manufacturer of industrial and consumer products and provider of
packaging services, with about 300 operations in 35 countries, serving
customers in some 85 nations. Sonoco is a proud member of the Dow Jones
Sustainability World Index (DJSI), a global composite index that
recognizes leading global companies in terms of economic performance,
environmental stewardship and social responsibility. Sonoco also has
been ranked as one of the 100 greenest large companies in the United
States in Newsweek's inaugural Green Rankings, which evaluated
the country's 500 largest companies on their environmental performance,
green policies and reputation. Sonoco, which was listed 94th,
had the best ranking of any U.S.-based packaging company. For more
information on the Company, visit our Web site at http://www.sonoco.com/.
SOURCE: Sonoco
Sonoco
Robin Montgomery, 843-383-7509
robin.montgomery@sonoco.com