USCC Protests Makeup of Vermont Depackaging Group

The State of Vermont became a leader for states passing legislation to remove food scraps as part of landfill organic waste with its Universal Recycling Law. As of July 1, 2020, organics pickup had to be offered by haulers in Vermont, relying on the food waste hierarchy for outlets for that material, tripling the amount of food that was rescued.

While composters originally saw a lot of business from the law, depackaging (equipment removing packaging waste from food scraps) systems began in the region that allowed large generators such as grocery stores to commingle all waste along with food scraps, leading many to cancel their contracts with composters. This was because composters were requiring source-separated material to produce quality compost. Much of the non-food waste from the depackagers has been routinely landfilled.

Zero-waste activists pressured the Vermont legislature to look at whether this outcome met the intent of the Universal Recycling Law. This resulted in this year's passage of Act 170, which “required a collaborative stakeholder process to make recommendations on the proper management of packaged organic materials in Vermont” (see DEC page here). USCC learned from members that the workgroup proposed was balanced heavily towards the depackaging industry, with two depackagers and two retail representatives, and only one compost representative and a farm composter. The Legislative and Environmental Affairs Committee recommended USCC weigh in to ask for more compost representation.

From the letter: “The USCC is very concerned about the issue for several reasons:

*the diversion of clean, compostable material to the current depackaging process, where more material is eventually sent to disposal, is depriving the citizens of Vermont of valuable soil amendments at the same time it increases waste disposal, which opposes the goal of the Universal Recycling Law.

*composting businesses who were receiving clean material from generators who were achieving source separation – which benefits the top levels of the food waste hierarchy – are no longer receiving this material beneficial to the compost process, having to seek elsewhere or close their doors as a result.

*Vermont’s law was groundbreaking and has inspired organics diversion laws around the country; a thorough discussion by ALL stakeholders to the changes the new process has brought to the market-- and the intent of the law—is necessary because the procedural changes will impact other states and markets.”

Josh Kelly, the state regulator in charge of the group, provided this response:

“The statute clearly outlines who the participants are, however, the Agency will work with these participants to allow for broader participation from others like additional composters, associations, food rescue organizations and more. So long as the process can maintain an effective, communicative, and collaborative process, we see no reason to prevent other stakeholders from participating.

So far, representatives from the Vermont Compost Company, the Composting Association of Vermont, and the Vermont Foodbank have been sent information on this stakeholder group’s first meeting and how to attend remotely or to contact the Agency if they wish to attend in person.”

The group will have four meetings to discuss the law. See the USCC’s letter here.