Heritage has determined the boundaries of our sustainability program to include all business operations owned and under our management control. As such, the information provided here is for the comprehensive organization of Heritage Environmental Services — including subsidiaries Heritage Interactive Services, Heritage Thermal Services, Heritage Thermal of Texas, Heritage Transport Services, Solid Oak, and Rineco Chemical Industries.
Heritage is involved in every aspect of the industrial waste management hierarchy: prevention, reuse, deconstruction, detoxification, treatment, and disposal. First and foremost, Heritage is a solutions company, offering customers quality management services, with an innovative spirit and always with a safety/compliance mind-set. Heritage owns and operates seven TSDFs (US EPA regulated hazardous waste treatment, storage, and disposal facilities) — including two hazardous waste incinerators, a hazardous waste landfill, an inorganic hazardous waste treatment complex, and an energy-from-waste fuels blending facility. This network of fixed facilities include the advanced treatment technologies necessary to provide the best available treatment technology (BDAT) for hazardous wastestreams.
Our inorganic waste treatment facilities specialize in heavy metal contaminants in wastewaters and solids, alike. Though capable of treatment and disposal of nearly any inorganic wastestream, the more common types we deal with are corrosives, cyanides, heavy metal bearing wastes, and materials needing stabilization or debris treatment.
Our acquisition of Rineco Chemical Industries in 2017 added a new layer of expertise and efficiency for our customers to move away from waste disposal toward beneficial reuse of byproduct materials. Our facility is the largest hazardous waste alternative fuel blending operation in the U.S. We convert liquid and solid waste-derived fuels into an environmentally friendly secondary fuel source to replace non-renewable traditional fossil fuels in kilns producing cement. Read more here: https://www.ckrc.org/.
Heritage provides hazardous waste incineration services for a variety of wastes including pharmaceuticals, chemical wastes, consumer commodities, DEA-controlled substances, mixed infectious hazardous wastes, and a variety of byproduct wastestreams. In 2020, with the addition of a second incinerator via Heritage Thermal of Texas, we have increased our ability to internally manage waste material that require incineration for assured destruction. The facility is currently being utilized as an internal asset and is not accepting materials directly from customers.
Through a fleet of truck and rail resources, Heritage has an extensive national network of transportation in the continental United States. We can ensure complete transportation and logistics for full compliance. We recognize that movement of materials by rail is four times more carbon efficient than movement by truck and as such utilize rail between our facilities as much as possible and continue to encourage customers to also utilize rail for major projects when possible. Heritage has been recognized by our rail partner, CSX three times (2013, 2014 and 2019) with an Award for Chemical Safety Excellence. Heritage actively participates in the US EPA SmartWay Transportation program and has received an excellence award twice (2015 and 2016) for our results in reducing the carbon emissions of our fleet. We continue to replace older equipment and demand that new equipment has the latest features to minimize emissions. Read more here: https://www.heritage-enviro.com/heritage-marks-10-years-as-asmartway-transport-partner/.
Heritage provides on-site service programs for byproduct management and industrial maintenance services. Customized program services are contracted on a regional or enterprise wide basis by large multi-site manufacturing and refining organizations. These byproduct management and other programs focus on proper movement of waste within the customers site, proper management of waste/recycling when it is ready to leave the customer site, cost, risk, and sustainability reporting data. Many Heritage customers have achieved or are working toward the goal of Zero-Waste-to-Landfill. We operate several post-industrial recycling facilities where we specialize in finding solutions for hard-to-recycle materials and creating greater value for commonly recycled materials.
Other services performed at our customer’s facility or designated location include managing high hazard wastes, household hazardous waste collection programs, lab packing, industrial cleaning, and site remediation.
We provide support to customers in the areas of emergency response and disaster recovery. This commitment to addressing our customers concerns regarding potential risks from climate change are backed by lessons learned during our extensive remediation services provided for a major customer after the 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the collection of materials for many communities after hurricanes, e.g. household hazardous waste, pharmaceutical waste, orphaned tanks, etc. This group expanded its service to our customers and communities during the 2020 COVID-19 Pandemic by creating a new service line to provide business continuity services (https://www.heritage-enviro.com/coronavirus/). Services include Emergency Response to locations with active outbreaks and Routine Disinfection Services in addition to our regular Hazardous, Industrial and Medical Waste Transportation and Disposal (which was identified as essential/critical). See also: https://www.heritage-enviro.com/transportation-ofalcohol-ethanol-or-ipa-based-hand-sanitizer-in-the-era-of-covid-19/. Heritage was presented with the Excellence Award “COVID-19 Response Champion” from the Indiana Manufacturers Association for our work to support the community in 2020.
Our water transfer operations support the shale oil and gas industry with water transfer and well site support. Heritage personnel design and construct above-groundwater transfer pipelines to support the water requirements for hydraulic fracturing and transferring of flow back or produced water. Depending upon the site location, fresh and reused water may be provided to the customer. An emphasize is placed on a cycle of water reuse to minimally impact fresh water sources in the community. By avoiding the movement of water over roads by truck transport, Heritage is reducing the environmental footprint of operations and improving community safety by keeping over the road traffic to a minimum. These efforts have expanded our ability to assist new and existing customers with safe and environmentally sound practices in the pursuit of new energy sources.
Heritage provides sustainability reporting on multiple platforms including the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and customized customer dashboards in our IS2 Interactive database. Heritage subscribes to a fiscal year that starts June 1. This report represents activities from June 1, 2019 through May 30, 2020.