California Aims to Ban Recycling Symbols on Things That Aren’t


Last year, a number of environmental organizations filed lawsuits to combat misleading recyclability claims from large companies. Environmental groups have also criticized the oil and gas industry’s plans to expand production of petrochemicals, the main building blocks of plastic, as the process is highly polluting and creates new demand for fossil fuels.

The recycling symbol “subconsciously tells people that you’re buying things that you’re being environmentally friendly,” said Heidi Sanborn, executive director of the National Council for Management Action, who advocates for companies to take more responsibility to recycle their products.

“No one can lie to the public,” he said.

In California, the bill won the support of a coalition of environmental groups, local governments, waste shippers and recyclers. Recycling companies say this move will help them reduce non-recyclable trash that is thrown into recycling bins and needs to be transported, sorted and sent to landfill.

Pete Keller, vice president of recycling and sustainability at Republic Services, one of the nation’s largest waste and recycling companies, said in an interview that more than a fifth of the material his company processes nationwide is non-recyclable garbage. That means even on the best day of the Republic it only runs at 80 percent efficiency, processing materials it shouldn’t be processing, he said.

Some of the most common forms of non-recyclable garbage maring operations, which process six million tons of curbside recycling annually at Republic’s 70 facilities in the United States, are: snack bags, plastic film, grocery bags and packaging materials. Plastic bags, in particular, are not recyclable in most curbside recycling programs and notoriously in recycling machines.

“There are many products on the market today that should not have chasing arrows,” said Mr. Keller. “There really is no real way to recover and ultimately recycle these materials in any real end-market or curbside programs.”

The plastics and packaging industry opposed the bill, saying it would create more, if not less, confusion for consumers. An industry memo circulated among California lawmakers urging them to oppose the bill unless it is amended, arguing that it would “create a new definition of recyclability with unenforceable criteria for complex products and single-use packaging.”



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