ReSource Waste Services of Lewiston Achieves RCI Certification
Benefits Customers Seeking Certification from U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Program
The ReSource Waste Services of Lewiston facility that recycles construction and demolition waste (C&D) has been certified by the Recycling Certification Institute (RCI). The RCI certification was based on a rigorous evaluation performed by an independent third party of the facility’s processes and protocols and it also verified the integrity of the facility’s recovery/recycling reports.
The Lewiston facility is the only C&D processing facility in Maine to achieve RCI certification and is one of only two facilities in New England to achieve this certification. The other facility is ReSource Waste Services’ facility in Roxbury, Massachusetts, which achieved RCI certification in 2018.
“We are very pleased to have achieved this certification for the Lewiston facility,” said Jack Canty, the President and Chief Operating Officer of ReSource Waste Services. “This certification is important to many of the contractors who deliver C&D waste to the facility. If a contractor is working on a project that is seeking LEED green-building certification (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design), the contractor will earn credit toward that certification by delivering the C&D generated by the project to an RCI-certified facility such as ReSource Lewiston.”
LEED construction projects, certified by the U.S. Green Building Council, are required to meet minimum recycling rates for their C&D waste. “We are proud to play a part in our region’s progress toward sustainable construction and development,” Canty said. “Verified sustainability is becoming more and more important to project developers, architects, environmental groups and government agencies.”
Stephen Bantillo, executive director of RCI, said the Institute’s national certification program ensures integrity, transparency, accuracy and reliability in the recovery/recycling reports of participating C&D recycling facilities. Bantillo said that RCI used a rigorous, open, and comprehensive process for developing its protocols. Its primary focus, he said, is on accurate recycling accounting to ensure that the recovery and recycling reports issued by certified facilities are real, verifiable, reproducible, and reasonable.
Environmental Service Management Group, Inc. (ESMG) performed the evaluation for RCI. The ESMG evaluation, and additional information on RCI and the ReSource Lewiston facility’s performance, can be found here.
About ReSource Waste Services of Lewiston
The Lewiston facility, located at 38 Alfred A. Plourde Parkway, is Maine’s largest C&D processing facility and an important component of Maine’s solid waste management system. The facility supports approximately 40 direct full-time jobs, varying by season, and dozens more indirect jobs, and spends approximately $14 million per year on operating expenses, and conducts business with more than 100 vendors and 55 customers. The facility processed approximately 180,000 tons of C&D in 2023. Personnel and equipment are used to recover as much reusable product as possible that can be sold to end markets. Recovered materials can be used to for a wide variety of uses: fuel for electricity generation; medium-density fiberboard (MDF) manufacturing; asphalt paving; new cardboard and drywall; recycled plastic and metal products; and miscellaneous construction materials and soil substitutes.
