Scrap Metal Recycling

All of us at some time have filled our recycling bins at home with plastics and other recyclable materials and felt we’re doing something to help the environment. The problem is, city or municipal recycling makes up less than half the products recycled in the United States every year. Scrap metal recycling comprises the majority of recycling and turns old metal into new products, and does it cost effectively and pays the person to do it. An abandoned car or broken refrigerator could end up as a teel beam supporting the bridge you drive across every day. Here’s how the scrap recycling process works:

1. Metal fabricators buy material from mills or foundries to convert into usable metal forms.
2. Manufacturers purchase the metal to make a product – electronics, appliances, automobiles, steel beams, and more. Scrap is often generated as a byproduct of the manufacturing process (this is called prime or industrial scrap).
3. Companies and consumers purchase the product. At the end of the product’s life-cycle, it becomes scrap.
4.  Amcep Metals buys scrap from manufacturers, companies, and consumers and resells it to meet demand.
5. The mill or foundry buys the processed scrap and melts it down to make new steel or metal.

 

Electronics Recycling Process

Electronics go through several steps before they are completely recycled.  Each item is then assessed to determine if it has reuse value. Remaining electronics are disassembled and separated into their various grades such as circuit boards, plastics, and metals. The metals are sold to a mill or foundry just like other scrap. Circuit boards are shredded then smelted or refined.

Auto Parts Recycling Process

Most automobiles can be recycled for useable parts and components. After Amcep Metals purchases a car, it is inventoried and added to an online parts database. All autos must have a valid title. The parts are removed from the vehicle – either by Amcep Metals or the consumer at a pick & pull or pull & pay location – when they are sold. After the car has been stripped of all parts or the value of the scrap car exceeds the value of the remaining parts, the vehicle is crushed, shredded, and the resulting metals are sold to mills and foundries for melting.

Recycling

Recycling is something you can do to help cut down on waste. When you recycle, something old  can be recreated again, instead of just being thrown away. There are also two other ways that help us avoid waste.

 

True recycling is more than just reusing something. It means breaking something apart and turning it into something new. The most common things that can be recycled are paper, glass, and metal. Many types of plastic and things made of wood can also be recycled. If something cannot be reused, and it is made from a material that can be recycled, we can take it to a recycling collection bin so that it can be made into something new!

Why Should We Recycle?

Do you sometimes take out the trash at your house? You probably have a dumpster or garbage container outside of your house that a garbage collector comes and empties into a big truck once a week. Where does all the garbage go after the truck gets filled up? It goes to a landfill or a dump, where piles and piles of trash and waste are compacted (pressed down or crushed) and then buried in the ground. Grass can be planted over the buried trash to make the land look better and be safer. Sometimes landfills can leak dangerous chemicals into the soil that can eventually get to streams, lakes, and rivers, where water that we drink comes from. Lots of animals live in that water and drink it too. When landfills are built and taken care of the way they are supposed to be, they are not dangerous, but they do use up land that could be used for other things instead, like building houses.

When things are recycled, not as much gets thrown away and sent to landfills. Recycling helps keep our earth clean because not as much land is filled up with garbage. Recycling paper and wood means that not as many trees will get cut down, so not as many animals will have their homes destroyed.

Many products that can be recycled are made from materials that come from the earth. Minerals called ore and silica are used to make metal and glass. These are called natural resources because they are found naturally on the earth. This also means that we cannot make more of these resources, so when they are all used up, that’s it, we can’t create more to keep making products! Thankfully, there are still a lot of natural resources left, but each day there will be less and less since new products are always being made and using up more of the earth’s resources. We can help make the earth’s natural resources last longer by reusing things we already have and recycling things we don’t need.

Another problem with making new products, such as plastic, is that it creates pollution in the air that we breathe. The chemicals and other things that are used to create lots of products are dangerous and some of those chemicals are left over after the products are made and can eventually end up in water that comes into our houses through our faucets. Recycling does not create as many dangerous chemicals that pollute the air and water as making new products from natural resources does.

Ferrous Metals or Non-ferrous Metals