Enacting waste and recycling legislation

Law: Chapter 70A.530 RCW

To reduce plastic contaminants from single-use plastic bags in Washington’s waterways, land resources, and recycling system, the Legislature passed a ban on all single-use plastic bags in retail stores, groceries, markets, restaurants, and other vendors statewide. This legislation also requires businesses to collect and retain an 8-cent fee on all paper bags and durable, reusable plastic film bags provided at checkout. It also establishes minimum post-consumer recycled content and thickness specifications for these bags.

The recommended and preferred option is for consumers to bring their own clean, reusable bags for food and goods whenever possible.

For businesses, our Bag Ban Outreach Material Toolkit is now available. And it will be translated to over 23 languages, to support Washington businesses and stakeholders statewide.

Learn more about Washington’s Plastic Bag Ban

Law: Chapter 70A.240 RCW

The Recycling Development Center (Center) is an Ecology program in partnership with the Department of Commerce (Commerce). The Center was formed to provide or facilitate marketing, policy analysis, and research and development to strengthen recycling markets and processing in Washington.

Commerce provides business, marketing, and technical assistance to support the public and private sectors. The Center works with an advisory board representing public agencies, private industry, universities, and nonprofits.

The Center's goal is to improve domestic recycling markets. The work focuses on conversion or remanufacturing of waste, like mixed waste paper and plastics, into new products.

For more information contact the Recycling Development Center team at: recdevcenter@ecy.wa.gov

Learn about the Recycling Development Center

Learn about the Center's advisory board

Law: RCW 70A.205.045

To reduce contaminants in Washington's recycling stream, we developed a statewide Contamination Reduction and Outreach Plan (CROP) that was published in September 2020. The state CROP identifies problematic contaminants and includes a set of best management practices and resources to assist local communities to reduce them. Counties with a population of 25,000 or more and cities within those counties with an independent Solid Waste Management Plan (SWMP) are required include a CROP in their local SWMP by July 1, 2021.

For more information contact:

Peter Guttchen
peter.guttchen@ecy.wa.gov
360-407-6940

Learn about Washington’s Contamination Reduction and Outreach Plan

Law: Chapter 70A.205.715 RCW

To reduce food waste in Washington, we are partnering with other state agencies to write a food waste reduction plan, the Use Food Well Washington Plan.

This plan will be delivered to the legislature by Oct. 1, 2021. We are working in partnership with the Washington departments of health, agriculture, commerce, and the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction.

This law sets a 2030 goal to reduce food waste by 50%. The Use Food Well Washington plan lists recommendations on how to prevent the wasting of food, how to rescue more edible food for delivery to hunger relief organizations, and how to divert more true food waste to beneficial end uses – such as energy and soil amendment production.

Learn about food waste prevention

Law: Chapter 70A.520 RCW

This law directs us to evaluate and assess the amount and types of plastic packaging sold into Washington, as well as their management and disposal. We contracted with an independent consultant to conduct the evaluation and assessment. 

This law requires that we submit a legislative report by Oct. 31, 2020, including recommendations to reduce plastic packaging waste through industry initiative, product stewardship, or both. As part of this law, the Legislature intends that we consult with industry and consumer interests while developing this report and include options to reduce plastic packaging in the waste stream.

For more information contact:

Alli Kingfisher
alli.kingfisher@ecy.wa.gov

Law: Chapter 70A.515 RCW

This law requires all producers of architectural paint, selling in or into Washington, to participate in an approved paint stewardship plan through membership in and funding of a stewardship organization. This stewardship organization will submit a plan for implementation in October 2020. Pending our final plan approval, the program will start collecting paint in March 2021.

Learn about paint stewardship

Law: Chapter 70A.455 RCW

This law requires environmental marketing claims for plastics to follow uniform and recognized standards for "compostability" and "biodegradability." Plastic products marketed as such must be readily and easily identifiable as meeting these standards.

Under this law, the Washington State Attorney General and local governments have authority to pursue false or misleading environmental claims about a plastic product's "compostability" and "biodegradability."