Las Vegas Recycler Recognized for being EVERGreen!
Posted on August 6th, 2009 - 3:00 PMLast year, I got a call from Dr. Kim Cochran, EPA’s construction and demolition expert in DC. She was going to a Demolition Convention in Las Vegas and wanted to set up a tour with Evergreen Recycling. As the Regional EPA recycling contact, I’d been working with the great folks at Evergreen for many moons.
After the tour, she called me in awe — she’d seen a lot of recycling facilities — but they’d never seen anything like Evergreen, and said “Their facility is probably the most exciting recycling facility I have ever seen! I was really impressed with the numbers and types of materials they are able to recycle.”
Evergreen Recycling was an EPA Pacific Southwest award winner for transforming recycling efforts in Nevada with their state-of-the-art recycling facility.
They partnered with MGM MIRAGE, one of the world’s leading development companies, to divert 50,000 tons or 94.7% of the CityCenter project’s construction debris from landfill disposal in 2008. CityCenter, an 18-million-square-foot multi-use LEED registered project, will be one of the world’s largest sustainable urban communities.
Evergreen’s 85 employees have recycled over 200,000 tons of resources. Evergreen also developed a local market for drywall that removes the paper and makes it back into new drywall. Now that’s real closed-loop recycling — drywall in Las Vegas stays in Las Vegas!
Evergreen’s founder and President, Rob Dorinson, has been invaluable in supporting Nevada’s green building movement and helping Nevada’s recycling rate more than double in the past ten years. Luckily, I was able to tour Evergreen Recycling last year while I was on vacation, and it was the highlight of my visit. Of course, enjoying the Vegas buffets with family and friends was great too! Take a virtual tour and tell me what you think!
About the author: Timonie Hood has worked on EPA Region 9’s Resource Conservation Team for 10 years and is Co-Chair of EPA’s Green Building Workgroup.
Tags: architecture, construction, demolition, LEED, recycling, waste
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Question of the Week
August 7th, 2009 at 10:17 am
WOW! This is a great recycling facility. Thanks for sharing with us!
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August 7th, 2009 at 11:27 am
Thanks for putting a spotlight on this incredible facility, Timonie! Evergreen is truly a leader in the recycling industry.
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August 7th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Congratulations to Evergreen on your award. We are pleased to see a Nevada recycling company leading the way toward a sustainable future for our citizens.
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August 7th, 2009 at 8:54 pm
Bravo, Evergreen Recycling! Way to think outside the box. I am glad to see major companies making real efforts. Our family recycles and conserves as much energy as possible. What I am most proud of are the solar panels I built and installed myself. I saved a good chunk of change by doing that, and over the last 2 months I have saved 50% on my electric bill. I had so much fun doing it that I posted a blog detailing how to build a solar panel. If you would like tocheck it out the web address is: http://howtobuildyourownsolarpanel.x10hosting.com
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September 1st, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Great job Evergreen. It’s nice to see initiatives like this being undertaken by companies who aren’t necessarily small and ineffective.
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