Plastic recycling

Here is some data from ecomaine on plastic recycling (via The Vigorous North):

The non-colored (natural) HDPE milk jugs (marked with a number 2 on the bottom) are now commanding over $800 per ton ($18,000 per trailer load). We sell a lot of this material to a Company in York PA called Graham Packaging which makes new plastic containers for detergents and cleaners (non-food).

The Colored HDPE #2 containers are sold to various markets (including Graham Packaging) at $600 per ton. Again, they make new bottles out of scrap bottles.

The PET #1 containers are sorted automatically by our scanner and sold at $400 per ton to various markets that make carpet or stuffing for sleeping bags and jackets, etc.

The 3-7 plastic we mix and sell together because we don't get enough of any one of them to substantiate accumulating them in separate loads. These markets are in their infancy (just like the #1 & #2 markets were 18 years ago). However they're the smallest percentage of what we process... See below.

Make up of the Plastics we process:

Colored HDPE #2: 28%
Natural HDPE #2: 25%
PET #1: 25%
Plastics #3-#7: 22%

Paper mill closing will leave 208 jobless

"MILLINOCKET - Katahdin Paper Co. LLC says it's closing its Millinocket paper mill, putting about 208 people out of work.

Fraser Paper, which operates Katahdin's mills, cited high energy prices Thursday for the indefinite closure of the Millinocket mill effective on July 29.

Fraser CEO Peter Gordon says fuel costs have doubled over the past 12 months. Last year, the Millinocket mill consumed more than 400,000 barrels of oil.

Paper produced at the Millinocket mill is used in the magazine, catalog and retail-insert industries. Katahdin's East Millinocket mill, which produces paper used in telephone directories, is not affected."

- MaineToday.com

Lobster boat sales slow

"JONESPORT — For the first time in 24 years of building lobster boats, Wayne Beal doesn't have any job orders.

He has a 42-footer under construction at his boatyard -- but he's building it for himself, so he can give up boat building and go lobster fishing instead.

In Maine, where lobster is king, Beal and other lobster boat builders are braving tough times. With the lobster catch down and fishermen feeling an economic squeeze, boat sales have hit the skids.

So even with the uncertainties facing lobster fishermen, Beal believes he's better off doing that than sitting around and hoping for more boat orders to come in."

- Portland Press Herald