History of Wheelabrator Technologies Inc.
One Hundred Years of Innovation
- 1908 - 1913
- Founded in 1908, in Ohio, Wheelabrator operates under the name of the Sand Mixing Machine Company. In 1910, the company becomes the American Foundry Equipment Company and introduces the first industrial air pollution central devise. Known as the "American Dust Arrestor," its fabric screens trapped dust particles from foundry casting cleaning operations. This innovation leads to an entire product line, which later evolves into the introduction of a new company called the Wheelabrator Air Production Control Company (Wheelabrator APC).
- 1932
In 1932, Wheelabrator develops the airless centrifugal wheel, a rapidly spinning wheel designed to hurl abrasives at steel, concrete, and other industrial surfaces needing cleaning. Coined as the“Wheel + Abrator,”the invention of the airless centrifugal wheel, leads to the birth of the Wheelabrator Corporation. (The Wheelabrator triangle logo is a stylized version of that device.)
- 1960's
- In the late 1960s, Wheelabrator and Frye Industries, a print ink and copy paper manufacturer, merges and becomes Wheelabrator-Frye Inc.
- 1970's
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The passage of the Federal Clean Air Act spurs on the demand of Wheelabrator’s air-pollution control equipment. The Act also mandates the discovery of alternative technologies to replace old, pollution waste incinerators. In 1972, after several small acquisitions, Wheelabrator-Frye acquires Rust Engineering Company, a leading designer and builder of pulp and plants. This move proves to be the most pivotal in creating the Wheelabrator of today. The acquisition of Rust, which holds licenses with the Swiss engineering firm, Von Roll AC, helps Wheelabrator become a pioneer in the waste-to-energy industry.
By adopting Von Roll’s refuse-grate technology, already proven throughout Europe since the mid-1950s, Wheelabrator opens the first commercially successful waste-to-energy facility in the U.S. in 1975. Located in Saugus, Massachusetts, Wheelabrator continues to serve Massachusetts’ North Shore communities. Over the next 25 years, the company becomes the nation's most successful municipal waste-to-energy contractor. Widely known as the innovator of energy recovery technologies, operational procedures and air quality control systems, Wheelabrator sets new standards for reliable design, construction and safe operation of waste-to-energy facilities.
- 1982
- Decades of growth leads to a merger with The Signal Companies, Inc., based in La Jolla, California. Hampton, New Hampshire, becomes the headquarters of Signal Engineered Products Group, one of the two main operating units of the company. Midwest operations of Signal, Universal Oil Products (UOP), holds U.S. licenses with a German company for waste combustion furnace and grate technologies that rivals Wheelabrator's system. As a result of the merger, Wheelabrator acquires several former UOP waste-to-energy projects and the UOP German licenses were divested.
- 1985
- Signal merges with Allied Corporation to create Allied Signal Inc., which later decided to streamline its operations by spinning off some assets into a new company, The Henley Group, Inc.
- 1987
- Wheelabrator Technologies Inc. emerges as a publicly traded company offering leading waste-to-energy services. These services include: full-service engineering and construction services; diverse manufacturing capabilities; large- and small-scale air quality control systems; independent power project development; coal handling and transportation projects; and water and wastewater treatment operations and equipment.
- Late 1980's
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In July 1988, Wheelabrator and Waste Management Inc., the world's largest waste management company, enters into a merger agreement to acquire common stock shares of WTI amounting to a 22% ownership interest.
Wheelabrator enters the independent power production (IPP) market with the construction and operation of small power plants primarily using waste fuels such as wood.
- 1990
- Wheelabrator becomes a majority-owned subsidiary of Waste Management.
- Today
- As a wholly owned subsidiary of Waste Management, Wheelabrator’s waste-to-energy projects currently total 16 facilities nationwide with a combined processing capacity of more than 21,000 tons per day of municipal solid waste and an electric generating capacity of 609 megawatts (MW).
Wheelabrator's five independent power projects have the generating capacity to produce an additional 227 MW of clean electricity. Combined, Wheelabrator's facilities provide enough clean electricity to power more than 900,000 homes.
