 |
|
LOCAL GOVERNMENT CASE STUDY: |
ORANGE COUNTY -
OIL FILTER RECYCLING |
Orange County has one of the oldest oil filter recycling programs in North Carolina. For the past six years, the county has provided a convenient filter recycling service well integrated with its public collection programs for oil and antifreeze.
Orange County offers 12 separate locations for filter recycling including the County Public Works facility, the landfill’s vehicle maintenance facilities, all of the municipalities in the county and each of the county’s six convenience centers. All convenience center sites use a 55-gallon barrel covered with a clearly marked fiberglass igloo sitting on concrete pad (see picture below). The maintenance facilities do not include the igloo cover but all include signage to let the public know where to place the filters. A contractor serves the convenience center sites, while staff is responsible for monitoring the vehicle maintenance filter drums.
As of FY 06, Orange County was using Holston Environmental Services, from Greenville, S.C. as its filter and oil recycling vendor. Holston provides the 55-gallon barrels and charges the county $40 per full drum when picked up. The $40 rate was a decrease from previous years and should result in an approximate drop in program operational costs from $3,390 to $2,400.
Additional costs to establish Orange County’s program included $200 each for the cover igloos and $15 each for signs at the six convenience centers. The County collects 60 drums of filters per year, each containing 270 lbs. of uncrushed filters (Carrboro and Chapel Hill Transit crush their filters and get as much as 470 lbs. in the drum). County staff notes that they plan to advertise its program using “shelf talkers” at auto parts stores. Staff also suggested that communities starting oil filter collection programs might want to think about combining efforts with municipal, county, school bus and university or college garages to get a better deal with service vendors.
March 2006
For a PDF of this case study, click here.
| 
