Mechanical contracting · Rock Hill, SC
Cutting metal theft to nothing by changing one container
A regional HVAC contractor was losing condensing units and copper to theft from an open yard, and sending recoverable material to construction waste. Moving the material into secured containers stopped the losses and turned a disposal cost into a revenue line.
- Relationship length
- 3+ years
- Theft exposure
- Dropped immediately
- New streams captured
- Motors, compressors, sheet, duct
The challenge
What was happening
- Metal theft was concentrated in the contractor’s county and their yard was a repeat target.
- Condensing units and non-ferrous were stored exposed, visible from outside the property.
- Motors, compressors, sheet metal and used duct were going out with general construction trash.
- The business was moving toward a formal sustainability position and had no diversion data at all.
The approach
What we changed
- Placed enclosed containers so removed units were no longer visible or accessible from outside.
- Added point-of-generation containers for motors, compressors, sheet metal and duct.
- Set a pickup schedule matched to how fast the containers actually filled.
- Assigned a single account representative as the contractor’s point of contact.
The outcome
What resulted
- Theft rate and exposure dropped immediately after the units came off open ground.
- Recoverable material that had been going to construction trash started being captured and paid for.
- The contractor gained material totals they could point to as diversion evidence.
- The relationship has now run for more than three years.
“After moving to Custom Recycling and putting the units in a dumpster where they were not sitting exposed, our theft rate and exposure dropped immediately. We now had the capability to easily recycle motors, compressors, sheet metal, used metal duct and many other items that would typically just go into our regular construction trash.”
Let us look at your scrap stream.
A no-obligation site visit, a container plan sized to your process, and a written proposal. No pressure, no cost.