Round Lake Beach to reinstate electronics recycling
Round Lake Beach will reintroduce a drop-off center for electronics recycling, a service among many throughout Lake County discontinued in 2015 because of cost.
Starting April 2, an area next to a former sanitary plant on Sunset Avenue will be available for drop-offs from 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. weekdays and 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturdays.
The move is made possible through a contract extension with Waste Management, the village's waste hauler. The company will provide a receptacle for the items and remove and replace it as needed.
The village plans to establish a recycling center there that will accept other materials in addition to electronics. Village officials say the idea has been in the works about four years.
"Electronics seems to be the biggest need, obviously," said Scott Hilts, public works director.
Mayor Richard Hill said the village had been waiting for the Round Lake Sanitary District to be dissolved. The sewage treatment facility closed in 1980 and was converted to wastewater storage. Lake County upgraded and expanded the facility in a $7.5 million project completed in 2016.
During the site approval process with Round Lake Beach, the county donated land for potential use as a recycling center.
"This is going to be an incremental, multistep process, but we wanted to have something," village Administrator Dave Kilbane said. "Electronics seemed like a good place to start."
For several years, Round Lake Beach and the Solid Waste Agency of Lake County collaborated to provide space at its public works yard for discarded electronics.
That program was suspended in 2015 because the value of the materials removed from the electronics dropped and the proceeds no longer covered program costs. More than a dozen sites closed and only four permanent sites remain in Lake County.
The waste agency since has been able to coordinate electronic collections with Waste Management. The company will take discarded electronics from Round Lake Beach to its facility in Antioch to be transferred to a recycling contractor for processing.
Pete Adrian, the agency's recycling coordinator, said options for electronic recycling are now available in several communities through waste haulers.
Waste Management also offers an "At Your Door" program in several suburbs as part of municipal contracts that allow residents to schedule collection of unwanted items, such as electronics, paint, garden chemicals or automotive products, according to spokeswoman Lisa Disbrow.
Electronics have been banned from landfills in Illinois since Jan. 1, 2012.
State law has required manufacturers to pay recycling costs for a set weight of electronic products. The law has been revised, and as of Jan. 1, 2019, population density replaces the weight-based standard and requires at least one permanent electronics recycling site in each county.