MSW COMPOSITION
National data collected by the EPA in 2018 estimates that 9.5% of consumer products landfilled are metal:
Figure 1: Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) landfilled by material (146.12 Million Tons ‘MT’). EPA, 2018.
METAL COMPOSITION
The most comprehensive national MSW composition study shows that landfilled metals consist of 7.2% steel, 1.8% aluminum, and 0.5% other non-ferrous metals, as illustrated in Figure 2.
Figure 2: Metals landfilled by type (10.53 MT Steel; 2.66 MT Aluminum; 0.74 MT Other Non-Ferrous). EPA, 2018.
Typical composition studies broadly categorize metal content in landfill materials without quantifying the elemental composition of these metals.
OUR METHOD
Our sampling methodology can precisely quantify the total non-ferrous metal content of landfill material by element rather than category.
We can determine the total % composition of metals such as aluminum, titanium, chromium, iron, cobalt, nickel, copper, zinc, palladium, silver, tin, platinum, gold, and lead.