So I read this post and was curious and called a friend of mine that runs a large asphalt plant here in town. I even woke him up...lol
I asked him why I see all of the shingles going in the dump every day, and I mean a lot of loads of them, when shingle are recyclable. He told me the only way he could even begin to use them were if all of the nail were removed. He has not seen one contractor willing to remove all of the nails during a tear-off when all of these shingles pile up. The logistics of removing the nails after the fact would be mind numbing. Tearing off a roof is already an unpleasant task. You add to that The task of removing every nail and you couldn't get anyone around here to do it. Time is another factor. Roofers are usually in a hurry to get in there and get the job done. Generally roofers are up against the homeowner, weather and every silly building code you could imagine.
These homeowners could be members of every recycling event in town, but when it is their own house that construction is slowed up on recycling seems a whole lot less appealing.
But I assure you that you want to do a lot of homework before you step off in something that leaves your shoes smelling funny. There is a reason these contractors are willing to pay dump fees for this stuff.
My shop is a couple miles from the dump on the same road. there are at times an endless train of loads of shingles going there in dump trucks and heavy dump trailers. I am going to do some more research on this today.
My buddy did say that where they do recycle them they grind them in smaller pieces and use a machine to separate the nail from the shingles. I can not imagine that that machine is cheap.
I will be doing homework with you today. It is time to tap into my own vast network of resources...lol
Bookmarks