Connecticut officials have been working for a decade to broaden the responsibility for recycling from municipalities and taxpayers to the companies that manufacture or sell certain commodities and the consumers who buy them. The effort began in 2007 when the General Assembly created a program called Extended Producer Responsibility, or EPR, requiring the electronics industry to help shoulder the costs associated with recycling televisions, computers, printers and monitors. Since then, similar programs have been created for paint, mattresses and mercury thermostats.
By including the cost of recycling these products into the purchase price, manufacturers and retailers can conduct their own recycling programs or reimburse municipalities that undertake the collections. So far, the program seems to be working well. A recent study conducted by the Product Stewardship Institute, a national nonprofit, concluded that the four existing EPR programs diverted more than 26 million pounds of materials from landfills, saved municipalities $2.6 million annually, created more than 100 recycling-related jobs and reduced greenhouse gas emissions by more than 13 million kilograms of the carbon equivalent.
“It’s empirical evidence of the value we believed EPR programs would bring to Connecticut,” said Tom Metzner, an environmental analyst for the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection. “This is the way to go. This is the way of the future.”
He added that EPR is a key part of the state’s goal to divert 60 percent of waste from disposal by 2024.
Jennifer Heaton-Jones, executive director of the Brookfield-based Housatonic Resources Recovery Authority, said recycling has increased noticeably in the Danbury area as a result of EPR. The paint recycling program has proven especially popular and has saved municipalities about $40,000 annually. “Collecting paint, which used to be the biggest cost for our household hazardous waste collections, now costs our municipalities nothing,” she said. She added 95 percent of Connecticut residents now live within a 15-minute drive of a paint collection site.
Before the paint program began in 2013, Metzner said, there were few sites for collection of latex and oil paint and what was collected was expensive to transport. People were told instead to let unused paint dry out and throw it away. But after the law required addition of a recycling fee to the cost of paint, manufacturers created an infrastructure for recycling, he said.
By 2015, 82 percent of latex paint collected was being recycled or reused in some fashion. “There was a huge pent-up need for this, and when it came on board, people were happy,” Metzner said. Connecticut was one of the first states to pass a law requiring manufacturers of computers, monitors and televisions to pay for the products’ transportation and recycling. The law was passed in 2007 and went into effect in 2011.
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