Community Corner

Norristown Recycling Event Yields 80 Tons of E-Waste

The event was held at Norristown Area High School in Norristown as part of ongoing e-waste recycling events hosted by Montgomery County.

The following was provided to Patch by Covanta:

Covanta, a world leader in sustainable waste management and renewable energy, in partnership with Montgomery County recently collected approximately 160,000 pounds of electronic waste (e-waste) at a local collection. The event was held at Norristown Area High School in Norristown as part of ongoing e-waste recycling events hosted by Montgomery County. Items collected from local residents and businesses included cellphones, televisions, laptops, PCs, tablets and cameras.

The collection was held in an effort to increase the amount of electronics that are recycled, reduce the amount of electronics discarded in regular household trash and educate the community on the importance of electronics recycling. Many electronics contain a wide variety of materials that can be recycled, which saves energy use and the need to mine more raw materials from the earth. In addition, many electronics contain components which can be hazardous in the waste stream and should not be thrown away with regular household trash.

“These collections are proven to benefit the environment and this is an overwhelmingly successful turnout for the event,” said David Sharp, business manager for the Covanta Plymouth Energy-from-Waste facility also known as the trash-to-steam plant in Conshohocken. “We’re very thankful to the residents, businesses and officials of Montgomery County for making this possible and for taking the time to properly dispose of their electronics.”

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About 1,360 vehicles came to drop off e-waste, a record for a collection event of this kind. The nearly 80 tons of e-waste were loaded onto eight transfer trailers that were then sent out for recycling at Covanta’s Philadelphia e-waste facility. Covanta handles all e-waste recycling for Montgomery County and its surrounding areas. 

“Montgomery County is committed to sustainable waste practices and we are proud of our residents and businesses for their participation and support,” said Veronica Harris, Montgomery County Recycling Manager. “The service provided by Covanta was exceptional, especially given the extremely high volume of traffic and the materials being dropped off.”

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Covanta handles e-waste recycling for Montgomery County and surrounding areas, and is also the operator of the Plymouth Resource Recovery Facility, also known as the trash-to-steam plant, in Conshohocken. The facility has economically provided safe, reliable and sustainable municipal solid waste disposal for municipalities throughout Montgomery County since 1992 and generates approximately 32 megawatts of clean, renewable electricity – enough to continuously power thousands of area homes.


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