The move comes as the company prepares to begin commercial operations in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

Sortera Alloys, headquartered in Fort Wayne, Indiana, has announced the appointment of Michael Siemer as chief executive officer. He replaces company founder Nalin Kumar, Ph.D., who assumes the new role of chief technology officer.

Prior to joining Sortera, Siemer served as president of OSIsoft, the data management platform company now part of Aveva, where he oversaw the strategic vision and future of OSIsoft, created and led the new executive committee and supported the company's global revenue growth and subscription transition. He also previously served as vice president, operations technology, at Devon Energy, in addition to having roles with Sandridge Energy and 3M. 

Siemer holds a BS in electrical engineering from Syracuse University, an MS in electrical engineering from Colorado State University and an MBA from Oklahoma Christian University.

“I couldn’t be more pleased to be named CEO of such a great company as it moves from pilot to commercial operations,” Siemer says. “At Sortera, we are delivering high-quality materials without the tremendous impact that comes with virgin feedstocks. I am excited to lead this experienced team forward, which will have a major impact on the circularity of heavy industry.”

Kumar and Manuel Garcia founded Sortera in 2020. The company says it is using its artificial intelligence (AI) and engineering expertise to deliver high-throughput, high-purity sorting processes that also keep costs down.

In late 2021, Sortera announced it had received $10 million in new funding led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Kirkland, Washington. The investment builds on previous funding from Chrysalix and the Department of Energy Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) and will help Sorter scale operations and grow its team, with initial efforts targeted at high-quality industrial metal recycling from automobiles.

“As an early lead investor, Breakthrough is thrilled with the trajectory and great progress made by Sortera Alloys over the past 11 months,” Carmichael Roberts of Breakthrough Energy Ventures, says. “Nalin, Manny, Ben [Pope, vice president of commercialization] and the entire team have had unprecedented success in a short period of time. Now with a leader like Michael coming on board, the transition from pilot stage to commercial operations will be all-the-more swift.”

Sortera Alloys says it uses advanced AI-powered imaging, data analytics and sensors to sort aluminum alloy feedstock. The company operates from a 10-acre facility in Fort Wayne, and its first mass-production plant is under development and will be operational by summer 2022, Sortera says. It has been shipping trial truckloads of aluminum feedstock, including cast, sheet and extrusions, for the past few months from its pilot scale plant. 

Sortera, a spin-out from the Department of Energy’s ARPA-E METALS Program, says it has more than 25 issued and pending patents.

“We are very proud of what we have accomplished at Sortera to bring circularity to metals markets,” Kumar says. “With Michael joining as CEO, I am greatly looking forward to his taking the company to the next level.”

Sortera says its AI-powered sorters can upgrade feedstock streams and remove unwanted contaminants. The upgraded streams can then be used to make new products in markets ranging from automotive cast and flat-roll products, building and construction, aerospace and consumer packaging. 

Vipa is a global trader of recovered fiber and other recyclables.

Myles Cohen has been named to the board of Vipa USA Inc., according to an announcement by Marc Ehrlich, CEO of Lausanne, Switzerland-based trading company Vipa Group and chairman of Retripa, a Swiss company that processes recyclables.

Vipa USA has had trading offices in California since 2019.

“Myles has the knowledge and experience that Vipa needs to scale up our recycling trading in North America,” Ehrlich says. “Over much of the past two decades, Myles has been one of the foremost leaders and intimately involved in virtually all aspects of the recycling industry. In addition to his role as a senior executive in two major recycling companies, he also served in leadership roles within the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries (ISRI), serving three terms on the board of directors, two years on the Executive Committee and two years each as president of ISRI’s paper recycling chapter and a chairman of ISRI’ paper division.”

Cohen currently serves as the principal of Circular Ventures LLC, an advisory firm that provides board representation to trade associations and public and private entities that are involved in recycling, packaging and the circular economy. He also serves on the advisory board of The Pack Green Coalition, is the North American consultant to Norexeco for pulp financial hedging, is the exclusive agent for a patented packaging innovation known as Recyclestrip and consults to several other public and private entities.

“It’s been a privilege and honor for me to serve in executive leadership roles at two great companies steeped in a great heritage of recycling and sustainability, Sonoco and Pratt Industries, in which I had the opportunity to lead an effort to build something from a vision into reality,” Cohen says. “With Vipa, I have the opportunity to assist them in doing the same thing.”  

Cohen adds that North America is the “next frontier” for Vipa, which is a global leader in trading recycled materials globally. “Over the past half-century, the Ehrlich family and their employees have created a culture that is trusted throughout the world, and we intend to prove that to the North American market as well, for the trading of recovered fiber, as well as scrap metal and plastic.”

Vipa Group, with offices throughout Europe and the United States, is the leading exporter of recovered paper out of Europe. The company serves a variety of markets, including China, Southeast Asia, India, Europe and the South America. Vipa buys and sells millions of tons of recovered materials in more than 100 countries globally from its 13 offices around the world, including in North America.  

When Recycling Today profiled Vipa Group in 2020, Erlich said, “Being leaders in the European market with 25 percent market share, we strongly believe we also can be a link between the North American continent and Asia.”

He added, “The United States is exporting double the quantity of recovered paper compared to Europe, so our potential for growth is enormous.”

Co-founder of Austria-based equipment provider Erema Group has died at age 84.

Austria-based plastics recycling equipment provider Erema Group GmbH has announced that Georg Wendelin, the company’s co-founder, former managing partner and long-time chair of its supervisory board, died on March 29 at the age of 84.

In 1983, at a time when plastics recycling was in its infancy, Georg Wendelin, together with Helmut Bacher and Helmuth Schulz, laid the cornerstone for the group of companies that, by its own description, is now a global market leader in the plastic recycling technology sector.

In that year, those three founded Erema and built its first plastics recycling machine. “With his pioneering spirit, his business acumen and his respectful and appreciative management style, Georg Wendelin actively shaped the success of the company, attentively and proudly keeping track of how plastics recycling went from being a niche to a trend and how the Erema Group became the driving force behind the circular economy,” states the firm.

In 2019, Wendelin was awarded the Golden Decoration of the Republic of Austria in recognition of his work.

“We will greatly miss Georg Wendelin as a personality who was closely associated with us for all these years,” says Manfred Hackl, CEO of Erema Group and himself a long-time friend of Wendelin’s. “Because of his humanity, he was a highly respected figure of leadership on all sides,” adds Hackl.

States the company, “Georg’s sudden death fills everyone throughout the Erema Group with great sadness, but also with gratitude for his work, his trust and his unwavering involvement in the Erema Group.”

Current ownership group sells four mills to Miami-based H.I.G. Capital.

New York-based private equity firm Lindsay Goldberg says it has entered into an agreement to sell Pixelle Specialty Solutions LLC to Miami-based H.I.G. Capital. Pixelle operates virgin-fiber specialty paper and packaging mills in Jay, Maine; Chillicothe, Ohio; Spring Grove, Pennsylvania; and Stevens Point, Wisconsin.

H.I.G. Capital describes itself as a global alternative investment firm with $48 billion of equity capital under management. H.I.G. formerly owned recycled-content paperboard producer Caraustar Industries but sold it to Greif in 2019.

Earlier this year, H.I.G. sold paper producer Sustana to a unit of New York-based Blackstone. Last year, it purchased North Carolina recycled-content board producer Jackson Paper Manufacturing and it also owns recycling equipment maker Wastequip.  

Collectively the four Pixelle mills operate 11 paper machines and produce more than 1 million tons of paper annually, according to Lindsay Goldberg.

“Together with Lindsay Goldberg, Pixelle has developed a broad, innovative portfolio of industry-leading brands across the specialty papers and sustainable packaging markets,” states Pixelle CEO Timothy Hess. “In under four years, we have transformed Pixelle into the leading specialty-focused paper producer in North America through three strategic acquisitions and successful implementation of a continuous improvement program. We thank Lindsay Goldberg for their partnership and look forward to our next chapter with H.I.G. Capital.”

Credit Suisse served as lead financial advisor to Pixelle on the transaction while Houlihan Lokey also served as financial advisor to Pixelle. Cravath, Swaine & Moore LLP served as legal advisor to Pixelle. Credit Suisse and Macquarie Capital are providing “committed financing in support of the transaction,” says Lindsay Goldberg. Macquarie Capital and Jefferies acted as financial advisors and Ropes & Gray LLP provided legal advice to H.I.G. Capital.

The transaction, terms of which were not disclosed, is subject to conditions and regulatory approvals and is expected to close in the second quarter of this year.

Association points to several corporate efforts to lower the red metal’s carbon footprint.

The New York-based International Copper Association Ltd. (ICA) says several of its member corporations are making strides in their work with copper byproducts and circular industry partnerships to ensure copper’s circular economy loop is fully closed.

The ICA points to Australia-based Rio Tinto, Germany-based Aurubis and Sweden-based Boliden as member companies investing to “take the lead” in what it calls industrial symbiosis. ICA defines that as “the concept of recovering and reusing discarded resources from one industrial operation by another” and says it “presents unique opportunities for the copper industry to contribute to the circular economy.”

ICA says, “Discussion of the circular economy in the copper industry often concentrates on copper’s ability to be recycled over and over again without any loss of properties and the subsequent recovery of end-use products. However, industrial symbiosis focuses on responsible practices further upstream in the value chain, highlighting the unique opportunities that can come from innovative uses of copper byproducts from the production and refining processes and the impact of industry partnerships on sustainable practices."

Copper byproducts, ICA says, have applications in numerous fields, including construction and infrastructure, and can be applied to the production processes of other materials such as aggregates, steelmaking, zinc recovery or as reagents in mining.

As its first example, ICA says iron silicate, a byproduct of Aurubis’ copper smelting and refining, can be produced as a stone, similar to igneous rock; as a granulate, similar to a natural volcanic glass; or as a fine powder, similar to mineral flour.

“It is very durable and extremely strong and hard,” ICA writes. The association says iron silicate is frost and weather resistant, does not absorb water and has an ideal coarseness, shape and density to make it a substitute for natural aggregates.

According to ICA, each cubic meter of iron silicate stone prevents the mining of 1.4 cubic meters of rock. “In this way, byproducts of copper slag can help with maximizing mineral extraction from previously used materials and reduce the need for further mining of aggregate products,” the group says.

The iron silicate has widespread applications in the construction sector, from road construction and asphalts to soil stabilization and hydraulic engineering. With stable physical and chemical properties, iron silicate is compatible with numerous materials, such as limestone, soil, clay, clinker, cement, sand and gravel.

Reusing copper slag iron silicate, which would otherwise be discarded in a landfill, allows Aurubis to contribute to reducing waste in the copper industry and saving natural resources in the construction industry, says ICA.

Boliden’s Rönnskär, Sweden, smelter is one of the world’s largest recycling facilities for metal in electronic material, including copper, according to ICA. Operating since the 1960s, the copper smelter processes 120,000 metric tons of material every year. Several copper byproducts are extracted during the copper smelting process, and Boliden “actively promotes the reduction of waste through the application of copper byproducts for other sectors.”

Boliden extracts copper sulphate and copper telluride from its smelters in Rönnskär and Harjavalta, Finland. Copper sulphate is a blue compound that can be used as a reagent in the mining industry or as an electrolyte in copper refining. However, copper sulphate is most often applied in agriculture as a fungicide and for treating copper-deficient soils.

Copper telluride is a black powder used as an alloying substance in the steel industry and in rubber production. Copper telluride is often sold for processing into pure tellurium and selenium. Selenium is used in pharmaceuticals, soil improvement and paint manufacturing and is found in many types of food.

Additionally, Boliden extracts zinc clinker and iron sand in Rönnskär. Zinc clinker is a yellow powder that comes from copper slag. Metallic zinc can be extracted from the powder. Iron sand is a black, coarse powder that has excellent insulation and drainage properties, making it “an ideal aggregate in road and building construction,” says ICA. Its high density and angular shape make it effective as a blasting abrasive and aggregate in high-density concrete.

“While recycling copper from electronic material already contributes to the circular economy, Boliden’s extensive use of copper byproducts from this process further highlights the potential of industrial symbiosis for the copper industry and the possibilities of reducing waste from the recycling processes themselves,” the association writes.

Global copper mining firm Rio Tinto and France-based electrical equipment group Schneider Electric also have signed an agreement to partner for a symbiotic use of products and services, ICA says.

Under the new partnership, Rio Tinto will supply what it deems responsibly sourced copper to Schneider Electric, which sells products ranging from electrical car chargers to industrial robotics. In return, Schneider Electric will provide energy and industrial services to Rio Tinto as the companies work together to “create digital platforms, technologies and solutions across the mining supply chain” in pursuit of decarbonization.

“This unique partnership will help accelerate decarbonization and renewable energy solutions by combining low-carbon materials with cutting-edge digital technology,” says Alf Barrios, chief commercial officer of Rio Tinto.

“We are excited to work with Rio Tinto to develop clean and pioneering solutions to meet industrial decarbonization challenges,” says Barbara Frei, an executive vice president with Schneider Electric.