OWEGO, N.Y. (WIVT/WBGH) – Owego-raised entrepreneur and owner of Upstate Shredding-Weitsman Recycling, Adam Weitsman is reinforcing his dedication to environmental preservation as he plans to implement multi-million-dollar changes to his business.

In order to improve his company’s carbon footprint, Weitsman has pledged $15 million to upgrade equipment across all of his operations to produce cleaner water and air qualities. As the Environmental Protection Agency continues to issue new, more strict mandates for capturing byproducts from metal shredders and recyclers, Weitsman plans to install cutting-edge technology systems for environmental conservation in order to properly mitigate byproducts from his recycling operations.

“I have been very pleased with our continued communications with the Environmental Protection Agency, and I am fully committed to doing what is necessary to proactively ensure that our facilities not only meet but exceed the regulations, current and future, being set forth by all State and Federal agencies,” said Weitsman. “As a father, I understand the importance of environmental conservation, and preserving our environment for future generations and we have already started the process of installing systems to further eliminate any potentially hazardous emissions at our facilities.”

Upstate Shredding-Weitsman Recycling is the largest private scrap metal recycling operation on the East Coast. For decades, the company has strived to be an industry leader for environmental protection and conservation in the community. Upstate Shredding was one of the first shredders in the country to come to an agreement with the Environmental Protection Agency on the mandate and immediately began working on new environmental retention ponds at their Owego location. The pods are the first of many technologies expected to be implemented over the next two years.

Scrap metal shredding facilities are required to control 81% of emissions under the Clean Air Act and New York State Implementation Plan to control the emissions of volatile organic compounds if they have the possibility to emit more than 50 tons of the compounds per year. Weitsman’s goal is to greatly exceed that requirement with the addition of necessary facility and equipment upgrades. The new air and water-scrubbing equipment is estimated to take approximately two years to manufacture and will be installed at the Company’s shredders located in Owego and New Castle, Pennsylvania.