EDITORIAL: Mandate uniform recycling standards
Aug. 9—State Attorney General Michelle Henry and 12 counterparts from other states have asked the U.S. Environmental Agency to better regulate plastic pollution.
Any progress would have to begin with uniform regulation of plastics recycling. Perversely, the recycling symbol on almost all plastic products and packaging has, in effect, become a license to pollute.
As reported recently in The Washington Post, there are more than 20,000 different recycling programs in the United States, each with its own rules. The bottom line is that most plastic products are not easily recyclable even if they carry a recycling symbol. Consumers might believe they're recycling when they place any plastic item with a symbol in the recycling bin, but most of it ends up in landfills.
A national survey by the environmental group Greenpeace found that the only consistently recycled plastics are "1" or "2."
Most plastics can be recycled, but not easily and not at scale to make doing so commercially viable.
The plastics industry itself, rather than regulators, created the coding system, brilliantly creating the impression that plastics consistently are recycled and fending off pressure to reduce plastic production. That's why Pennsylvanian taxpayers find themselves providing $1.7 billion in tax subsidies for a Beaver County petrochemical refinery that produces plastic pellets for packaging.
Congress should follow the example of most of Europe and mandate uniform, honest recycling standards.
