Maui’s SOS Metals Island Recycling facility changes hands

PUUNENE—Maui business owners Sandy and Don Shadrow announced the sale of their company, SOS Metals Island Recycling, to Schnitzer Steel Industries, which also operates a scrap metal processing facility on Oahu.

The Shadrows, brothers from Los Angeles, have been in the business of recycling scrap metals of all types, including jet engines, for over 30 years. When both men bought homes on Maui, they recognized a demand for their services.

“We drove around Maui and saw hundreds of abandoned appliances and cars,” Sandy Shadrow said. “It was a mess.”

In March 2005, SOS Metals Island Recycling stepped in as the only scrap metal facility on Maui. The recycling facility is located on a three-acre plot at the Central Maui Base yard.

The site included a 12,000 square-foot enclosed warehouse, a high-speed auto bailer (car crusher), and an Envirorac System which is used to safely separate fluids from old vehicles. In 2006, Maui county signed a contract with SOS to process derelict vehicles and appliances dumped along Maui’s roads.

In July 2008, SOS won another county bid, this time to clean up the Hana Landfill. For 12 years, miscellaneous scrap metal, 3,000 derelict vehicles, broken appliances, propane tanks, batteries, and tires had been stockpiled at the Hana landfill.  SOS worked on site at the landfill to prepare approximately 4,000 tons of materials for hauling to their facility.

There was also an untapped amount of energy savings dividends in restoring the Hana Landfill. When this project was completed, SOS saved approximately 35 million pounds of green house gases and 2 million gallons of gasoline, the company states. All of these energy savings were accomplished through recycling.

In 2010, SOS partnered with the County to implement a pilot scrap metal collection program at the Central Maui Landfill. Every month about 50 tons of metal are dropped off by the public, at the landfill, and is hauled off to SOS for processing.

Recently, working along with Maui County, SOS implemented the “Earth Day Everyday” program and offered free pick-up of derelict vehicles. As of September, they picked-up over 1,600 vehicles. Recycling one car saves 120 lbs. of limestone, 2,500 lbs. of iron ore, and 1400 lbs. of coal that would be used to make new steel. The recycling of one car saves 86 percent in air pollution (from the burning of coal), reduces 8,800 lbs. of green house gases and a saves 502 gallons of gasoline, the company said.