Even concrete can be recycled.
P. Flanigan & Sons, a Baltimore-based heavy construction builder, has learned not only can concrete, asphalt and demolition debris be recycled, but the process can lead to significant cost savings.
The builder?s new concrete-recycling plant in West Baltimore has cut down the firm?s costs of landfill space alongwith trucking and fueling expenses, said Pierce Flanigan IV, vice president of plants and equipment for P. Flanigan & Sons.
“We saw this as an opportunity to offer a unique product to our customers and send less materials to landfills,” Flanigan said. “We?re always looking to try new things and innovate.”
All trucking companies are coping with diesel fuel costs above $4.80 a gallon in the Baltimore region, but firms like P. Flanigan & Sons are also dealing with increasing landfill expenses. Since 2000, the cost to send one load, or 20 tons, of materials to a landfill has jumped from about $40 to about $120 a load, Flanigan said. The expense is even more when considering how much it costs for a truck to travel to and from an Anne Arundel County landfill, he said.
About two years ago, P. Flanigan & Sons purchased an old iron foundry on about seven acres of land next to its asphalt plant in West Baltimore. The firm spent about $2 million and took about a year to convert the old facility into a fully operational concrete-recycling plant.
Old sidewalks, curbs, gutters and road slabs are collected and put through a crusher at the plant. The smaller pieces of concrete can be used as gravel for new construction projects, and the process reduces the need for gravel mining.
P. Flanigan & Sons has about 10 employees working at the new facility and hopes to recycle about 250,000 tons of materials annually, Flanigan said.
The process offers environmental benefits on top of economic benefits, said Michael Furbish, president of the Furbish Co., a sustainable-building firm in Baltimore.
The production of cement, the main component of concrete, accounts for 5 percent to 10 percent of the world?s total carbon dioxide emissions, contributing to global warming, according to a 2007 study from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.
“If we can take excess concrete and use it for aggregate, it?s much better to do than throw it in a landfill and make more cement,” Furbish said. “There?s so much [carbon dioxide emissions] from the production of cement because the process takes so much energy.”
