Vermont Is First in the Nation for Household Hazardous Waste Disposal – op ed by Steve Caldeira

First published on Real Clear Policy

Vermont has emerged as a trailblazer in helping people dispose of household products that can catch fire or leak after their packaging expires. Lawmakers there worked with manufacturers to devise a disposal program that can serve as the basis for a nationwide model.

Legislatures from California to Connecticut are considering similar statutes that would require producers to organize and pay for the safe removal of hazardous materials from homes. They are weighing using the Vermont approach, which uses Extended Producer Responsibility or EPR programs to deal with household hazardous waste.

The Vermont law is their North Star and for good reason. The Green Mountain State was the first state in the nation to enact a household hazardous waste EPR law - Act 58, which passed last year. Experts tout it as a program not only with good intentions but also with a good chance of succeeding. Manufacturers that do not participate in the collection plan will be barred from selling certain products in Vermont. Government and industry officials are working together to design a practical and fiscally sound process. The Household & Commercial Products Association, the American Cleaning Institute, and Vermont business groups helped legislators shape the plan, which achieved lawmakers' goals without being prohibitively complicated.

Various versions of the law have been debated for a decade. But manufacturers raised serious questions as the latest iteration approached final passage. In the end, lawmakers jettisoned a variety of tricky mandates and manufacturers have created a nonprofit Stewardship Organization to implement the disposal effort. Fundraising is underway among manufacturers to make sure the project gets started on schedule next July.

The Vermont Agency of Natural Resources has classified household products labeled with "Caution," "Toxic," "Flammable" and the like as Household Hazardous Waste. The law gives producers the responsibility for disposing of these products at the end of their life cycles. It also contains incentives for them to improve their packaging.

The producer-led Stewardship Organization is tasked with disposing of the products under government oversight. It also will finance the collections and the infrastructure necessary and educate the public about the program.

Besides collecting and disposing of expired products, the Stewardship Organization will convene a steady cadence of meetings for stakeholders and agency officials. Regulators anticipate ongoing refinements of the program to make sure it is working well.

None of this will be easy or inexpensive. Producers are working now to raise significant funding to allow the Stewardship Organization to put the basic building blocks in place. In addition to the pickup and tracking system, the organization plans to establish simple ways to communicate with consumers and manage their data.

Producers will survey citizens periodically to assess their satisfaction with the system. But the program doesn't have to be fully in effect all at once.

The Stewardship Organization is initially slated to meet a minimum five percent participation rate annually based on the number of households the program serves.

The diverse categories of products involved include aerosols, automotive products, nail polish and polish remover, fire extinguishers, flammable degreasers, lighter fluid, glue, and paint thinners. Not included are pesticides, insect repellents, turf products, and cleaning products that contain bleach and other antimicrobial agents.

Vermont officials and industry leaders have done a lot of hard, detailed thinking, which other states are scrutinizing and potentially planning to emulate. That's a good outcome. Legislators and regulators often wish they could accomplish all their wishes at once. That rarely happens. Doing what can be done in a methodical way will produce better and more lasting results.

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