AMERIPEN (The American Institute for Packaging and the Environment) supports two bills before the U.S. Senate that address critical elements of packaging recycling and environmental policy: the Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act of 2023 (S.1189) and the Recycling and Composting Accountability Act of 2023 (S.1194). AMERIPEN believes that passage of these measures will enable the U.S. to reach ambitious and necessary goals of reusing more packaging materials and achieving a more circular economy. Enacting these bills represents another critical bi-partisan step Congress can take now to improve recycling in the U.S.
There is a lot of discussion in this country about improving sustainability, building access to packaging recovery and recycling, and protecting the environment. The Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act and the Recycling and Composting Accountability Act put some teeth behind the effort by providing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the resources that will help inform recycling policy with improved collection and access to data and reporting as well as create the infrastructure and markets to increase the use of emerging packaging materials, recycled content and packaging recovery and recycling technologies, including composting.
The Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act of 2023 (S.1189)
The Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act of 2023 would establish the pilot Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Program to provide grants for projects to make recycling programs more accessible to rural and disadvantaged communities, significantly improving accessibility to recycling systems in these communities through a hub-and-spoke model for recycling infrastructure development.
Packaging can be a lifeline to underserved communities for food and other critical products and this legislation will help those communities put in place the infrastructure, education, accessibility, and markets for recovering and recycling the packaging materials of today and the future. All communities deserve policies that will equalize and improve recycling and sustainability opportunities across the board. The Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act of 2023 will do just that and AMERIPEN strongly supports such grant funding mechanisms.
The Recycling and Composting Accountability Act of 2023 (S.1194)
AMERIPEN also supports the Recycling and Composting Accountability Act of 2023, which will improve transparency for recycling and composting and provide critical baseline data to help boost recycling and composting rates and reduce waste by providing an accurate reflection of recycling and composting performance nationally and at the state level. This information will be critical to improving existing recycling and composting programs and evaluating future related policies. The Act will also explore the potential of a national residential composting strategy – something AMERIPEN believes is critical to identifying barriers to composting and help compostable packaging become even more successful in the US.
AMERIPEN appreciates that the Recycling and Composting Accountability Act of 2023 also includes language to require the EPA to provide an update on the Save Our Seas 2.0 Act report on recyclable material end market sales from material recovery facilities that process recyclable materials collected from households and publicly available recyclable materials drop-off centers and prepare a report on the end-market sale of compost from all compostable materials collected from households and publicly available compost drop-off centers. AMERIPEN is passionate about end market development, as evidence by our State Market Development Task Force made up of state recycling market development professionals from across the U.S., and we are pleased to see this legislation supporting related efforts.
AMERIPEN hopes that these two important bills can move forward this year to support the improvement of recycling and composting, as well as access and recycling market development, across the United States. We believe it is crucial that the Environment and Public Works Committee, and the whole Senate, will make these proposals a key priority this year.
At the same time, AMERIPEN and others to continue building partnerships with policymakers, communities and other stakeholders to further improve and innovate the current packaging recovery and recycling infrastructure in the U.S.