Company Showcase: River Metals Recycling’s Commitment to Kentucky Recycling

By: River Metals Recycling

[Image: River Metals Recycling cmyk]

River Metals Recycling takes pride in being one of the founding members of MI2 and eagerly anticipates the nonprofit’s triumphs, as well as the positive impact it will have on both the metals industry and the economy of Kentucky.

At River Metals Recycling (RMR), we buy ferrous and nonferrous metals to be processed, sorted, and shipped to various mills and foundries. These mills then melt the scrap metal and create new products. These finished goods range from steel or aluminum coils to brass or copper ingots. If you sell a scrap car to RMR on a Monday, it can transform into a steel coil being delivered to an automotive stamper by Friday. That is the circle of life in the scrap metal business.

River Metal Recycling is Kentucky’s largest scrap company, with nine Kentucky locations that span the state, from Paducah to Ashland. RMR was originally founded as part of The David J Joseph Co, a 140-year-old trading company that was acquired by Nucor in 2008.

At RMR, we are proud to say that we have been “Green” for over a century before recycling became cool. Our core business is processing end-of-life automobiles and appliances through our three shredders (Newport, Louisville, and Ashland). This process takes a car and fragments it into thousands of fist-sized pieces in seconds. From there, the steel, aluminum, copper, and other metals are separated and sorted from the waste to ship to consumers.

The main product we produce is called shredded steel (or shred). This product is loaded onto barges and shipped primarily to the steel mills of our parent company, Nucor, in Ghent and Brandenburg, KY. During a normal month, we will shred over 40,000 tons of cars and appliances.

We buy from a wide range of suppliers. From individuals with bags of aluminum cans to heavy industrial manufacturers, we value every pound that can be recycled.

At River Metals, we take our impact and contributions to the environment very seriously. We’re proud to be part of a circular economy, minimizing waste and energy use and reusing all materials so that almost nothing is discarded.