Gypsum Recycling Committee Update

By: Terry Weaver 

The committee met once again on December 11th and welcomed Brooke Fishel, who will be taking over for the Gypsum Association’s Susan Hines upon her retirement. The meeting focused on the Lifecycle Analysis (LCA) of recycled gypsum drywall, with a discussion on the objectives, methods, and continuing progress being made on this project. Terry Weaver, committee chair,  thanked Innovative’s team for their work in the development of the LCA, and members of the Innovative team provided real-time updates. They reviewed the four steps of the lifecycle assessment framework, including goal and scope definition, lifecycle inventory analysis, lifecycle impact assessment, and interpretation. University of Florida’s Tim Townsend also looks forward to offering an LCA-related session in Dallas as part of C&D World 2025. And Chair Terry Weaver expects to provide the committee’s recommendations regarding third-party certification in California to the CDRA Board of Directors shortly.

The committee discussed the management of gypsum drywall waste, considering both recycling and landfilling options. The waste can be recycled, with the paper fraction composted and the gypsum fraction used for agriculture, soil amendment, and cement production. The recovery of gypsum and paper, and the transportation of these materials to their respective end markets, are of course key concerns and addressed in detail in the LCA, which is still in draft form. The assessment of the environmental impacts of recycling versus landfilling involves a variety of factors such as market mixes, transportation distances, and paper management scenarios. Thus far, results have shown that recycling generally has a lower environmental impact than landfilling, with recycling being better in nearly all cases for greenhouse gas emissions, acidification, human toxicity, and ecotoxicity. Innovative recommends further data collection and quality improvement for inventory data sets.

Finally, Terry initiated a discussion about the use of FGD as a recycled material. Feedback from the Gypsum Association suggested that it might be better to assume that only virgin ore sources are being offset. We encourage all members to consider attending gypsum-related sessions in Dallas at C&D World.