Dive Brief:
- The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency is seeking comments on its draft needs assessment, part of the process of enacting its extended producer responsibility for packaging law. Public comments on the 400-plus-page assessment are open until Nov. 13.
- One of the topics covered in the assessment is a set of recommendations for how the state should establish “responsible end markets” for recycled materials. The REM standard would require certain businesses in the recycling value chain to show that recycled materials are being handled in a way that minimizes environmental and public health risks.
- Eunomia, which prepared the draft for MPCA, recommends that Minnesota align its REM standard with a draft national standard that is being developed by the Circular Action Alliance, the state’s producer responsibility organization.
Dive Insight:
REM requirements are an important facet of packaging EPR to make recycling systems more transparent and trackable. The concept was in part a reaction to reports of illegal dumping, especially after China and other countries imposed recycling import bans starting in 2017. These incidents raised public awareness of the role some U.S. recycling systems played in exporting waste to other countries.
The REM standards lay out the process for verifying claims that recyclables are handled “responsibly” along the value chain. Six of the seven U.S. states with packaging EPR laws have some kind of REM requirement, including Oregon and California.
Yet those states have slightly different requirements for REM verification. CAA argues that the patchwork of varied requirements could make it harder for required parties to comply across numerous states.
CAA has since proposed a standardized verification process meant to unify those requirements. According to CAA, this means end market entities could undergo a single audit process once every few years, rather than undergo multiple state-by-state audits.
Eunomia recommended that Minnesota aligns with the CAA draft standard to help avoid extra compliance costs and “establish a consistent minimum standard for all facilities accepting covered materials, regardless of their location.”
Most other states’ EPR models require the producer responsibility organization to verify whether facilities meet the responsible end market criteria. But Minnesota’s statute calls for the state to appoint an independent, third-party certifier instead.
CAA’s draft standard includes numerous due diligence and verification provisions, which Eunomia says “could serve as a useful reference point for supporting this verification process by establishing consistent documentation and evidence requirements that can be applied across end markets.”
CAA is still in the process of finalizing its national standard. It is working with SCS Standards and Assurance Systems, along with an REM standard development committee. That committee, made up of a range of trade groups, recyclers and state agencies, also includes MPCA.
The CAA draft also aligns with other aspects of Minnesota’s EPR law, such as its provisions requiring certain pollution prevention and environmental management practices, Eunomia said.
“Incorporating these [CAA] requirements could help ensure that recycling outcomes are assessed not only on whether materials are recycled, but also on how they are managed throughout the recycling process,” it said.
The needs assessment notes that the state has “well established” end markets for a range of commodities, particularly paper. The report named Liberty Paper and Smurfit Westrock as two main end markets in the state, noting that fiber also moves efficiently to mills in nearby states as well as Canadian provinces. However, Eunomia said it couldn’t determine whether existing end markets could absorb more volume once EPR kicks in.
For plastics, the end markets in the state were a bit more limited. Choice Plastics in Hennepin County was listed as the only in-state end market for certain plastics covered in the EPR law. More markets were available in neighboring states and across the U.S. and Canada. While there’s “additional available postconsumer plastics recycling capacity across major resin categories” like PET, HDPE And PP, the report said that “does not necessarily represent available capacity for Minnesota-generated residential packaging materials.”
Eunomia noted that end market capacity was not a major immediate concern for many of the covered materials, but it said maintaining good recycling outcomes would “depend on continued investment in infrastructure, market development, and responsible market verification.”
The needs assessment covers numerous other topics, including data about how Minnesota currently collects and manages the materials covered in the EPR law, as well as recommendations for building improved recycling and collection systems.
During the 2027-2028 period, MPCA is expected to publish a statewide materials list and CAA will submit its first stewardship plan.
