Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Record Scrap Metal Exports Recorded at Port of Redwood City

Port of Redwood City Executive Director Mike Giari announced last week that cargo tonnage for the fiscal year 2010-2011 at the Port of Redwood City was 871,940 metric tons, up 3.5 percent over the prior year, due to record exports of scrap metal.

Sims Metals exported nearly 445,000 metric tons from July 1, 2010, through June 30, 2011, mostly to the Far East. Giari credited Sims’ record to strong demand abroad for scrap metal, the company’s expanded staging area at the Port, and the fact that scrap now arrives by both truck and rail. This broadens the area from which the company can receive scrap metal from many sources, including old vehicles.

Sims Metal ahs been operating at the Port of Redwood City for 35 years, and the company’s recycling facility is one of the largest exporters of recycled materials in the Bay Area. Over the past four years the company has invested $14 million in its Redwood City operation by improving “downstream” recovery of non-ferrous metals, adding concrete paving, and installing advanced storm water controls, and modern processing equipment. The new equipment allows the Port facility to increase efficiency and capture additional metals that were not possible just a few years ago – particularly in the area of separation of non-ferrous metals such as copper and aluminum.

The Sims facility employs 60 workers who shred, shear, screen, sort, bale and ship metallic materials of all kinds, to serve as raw material for the production of steel and other recycled materials. State-of-the-art equipment shreds and separates hundreds of tons of steel per day.

“The Redwood City facility isn’t your grandfather’s recycling facility or just some junk yard,” says Steve Shinn, west regional president for Sims. “This is an advanced facility with multi-million dollar technology. Gone are the days of just crushing cars into blocks and shipping them to steel mills. Today, Sims is utilizing magnets, eddy currents, and optical sorting to reduce the need for landfilling as much as we can.”

The Port in Fiscal Year 2011 that ended June 30 also imported 49,628 metric tons of bauxite, a 19 percent increase; 31,755 tons of domestic sand, up 2 percent; 160,378 tons of building material aggregates, down 7 percent; and 185,566 tons of imported sand, down 7 percent. Thirty-six vessels called on the Port during the FY 2011.

-PMM Staff