Have you ever heard of the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act? This amendment to environmental conservation law would require companies who sell, offer to sell, or distribute packaging materials and products to register with a packaging reduction organization. Companies would also be obligated to work with the packaging reduction organizations to develop a packaging reduction and recycling plan.
To break it down even further, this bill would:
- Reduces plastic packaging by 50%, gradually over the next 12 years
- Reduces pollution in low income communities and/or communities of color (environmental justice communities) where packaging is produced, landfilled and incinerated
- Makes packaging safer for all New Yorkers
- Save taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars
- Reinvigorate the state’s recycling system
- Reduce greenhouse gas emissions
- Doesn’t allow chemical “recycling” to count as recycling
Let’s not forget the key statistics that come into play:
- 33 billion lbs of plastic waste enters the ocean annually worldwide
- $477 million dollars was proposed for NYC waste exports in 2025
- Only 5-6% of plastic waste from the state is actually recycled
- 12% of the state’s overall greenhouse gas emissions
- 35.7 million tons of plastics was produced in the U.S. alone in 2020
What you can do to help this legislation:
- Call Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie
- Call Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins
- Email your state legislators urging them to vote yes
- Email Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie and Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins
- Write a letter to the editor to your local/regional newspaper
For more information, visit www.beyondplastics.org/nys-packaging-reduction.
Resources:
Memo of Support – https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5eda91260bbb7e7a4bf528d8/t/65a940ea4c2c627a4869bee3/1705591020836/Packaging+Reduction+Act+S4246-a+A5322-a.pdf
Senate Bill S4246A – https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2023/S4246/amendment/A