E&E DAILY | Top lawmakers on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee are ramping up their focus on recycling and composting with two new bipartisan pieces of legislation.
EPW Chair Tom Carper (D-Del.) and ranking member Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) joined with another member, John Boozman (R-Ark.), to introduce the two bills yesterday.
Both the "Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act" and the "Recycling and Composting Accountability Act" seek to bolster waste management efforts at a time when public concern about disposal practices and pollution is on the rise.
“When we look at opportunities for reducing pollution and waste and creating good-paying jobs domestically, recycling is an area that unites most Americans,” Carper said in a statement. “Yet, our nation continues to recycle only about one-third of the products we consume each year, leading to more and more waste overflowing from our landfills and polluting our oceans."
The bills address different issues within the broader world of recycling, which includes composting, a form of organics recycling.
The "Recycling Infrastructure and Accessibility Act" aims to address struggles that rural communities have faced by creating a pilot recycling program. That effort would award grants to eligible communities with the aim of developing local recycling infrastructure and ultimately access.
The "Recycling and Composting Accountability Act" directs EPA to gather data on national recycling and composting rates, which can then be used to determine further actions.
Capito, whose state struggles with barriers to accessibility for both recycling and composting, championed the bills in her own statement.
"West Virginia has the lowest recycling rate in the country — only 2 percent,” she said. “This isn’t for lack of interest, but rather lack of funding and inadequate access to facilities. With more sparse populations over greater areas of land, rural communities struggle to sustain proper recycling programs."
The legislation would, she added, "alleviate this issue and make it more financially feasible to establish recycling infrastructure in underserved areas."
Boozman, who also co-chairs the Senate Recycling Caucus, meanwhile emphasized the economic benefits of bolstering recycling, which he noted "helps reduce waste heading to landfills while also creating jobs and driving innovation."
Bipartisan consensus on recycling has helped to power several bills to success, including two versions of the "Save Our Seas Act," both of which were signed by former President Trump.
The formal introduction of the new bills yesterday came after a hearing a month ago, during which lawmakers indicated bipartisan support for discussion draft versions of the bills. EPW members including Carper and Capito asserted the need for legislation to address ongoing nationwide waste issues (E&E Daily, Feb. 3).