HB2656 – Reducing waste associated with non-compostable single-use food service products.
Prime Sponsor – Representative Gregerson (D; 33rd District; Kent)
Current status – Had a hearing in the House Committee on Environment and Energy January 27th. Substitute with a number of small amendments passed out of committee January 6th. Referred to Appropriations; had a hearing there February 10th.
Next step would be – Dead bill.
Legislative tracking page for the bill.
SB6627 is a companion bill in the Senate.

Comments – The substitute and the amendments are currently available in the folder with the materials for the committee’s meeting.

Summary –
Food services businesses that provide opportunities for consuming food on site would be prohibited from supplying customers with single use utensils, straws and condiment packets unless they asked for them. Businesses without on-site opportunities for eating and places with a drive-up window would have to ask if customers wanted them before providing any. They would have to be provided as separate items. (Utensils are defined as things like knives and chopsticks; they don’t include things like plates, bowls, cups, or bottles.) The bill would preempt local ordinances prohibiting businesses from providing them unless customers asked for them.

Beginning January 1, 2021, they can’t use styrofoam products for serving or packaging food.

Starting October 1st, 2021, and every year through 2029, the Department of Ecology is to identify the counties and cities with independent solid waste management plans that are served by composting facilities that can effectively deal with compostable food service products. Starting July 1, 2022, food service businesses in those jurisdictions are prohibited from selling or providing food in or with plastic, coated fiber, or coated paper catering trays and produce bags.

Starting on a date to be determined by the Department, they’re prohibited from selling or providing clear plastic food wrap and shrink wrap; plastic containers for uniquely shaped foods like deviled eggs and cupcakes; flexible plastic packaging used to preserve moisture and freshness; and plastic containers for hot meats such as ribs and rotisserie chicken. The Department is to determine the starting date for prohibiting each of these categories by seeing whether at least two suitable and readily available alternatives for the category exist and whether at least two vendors make a suitable alternative commercially available. If they do,  the prohibition of that category of items is to begin a year later, and the Department is to repeat this process once a year for any categories it hasn’t yet established a starting date for. On January 1, 2030, these rules are to become effective for all the product categories.

Food service businesses may use durable, reusable food service products; recyclable fiber-based, glass, or metal food ones; recyclable plastic bottles and beverage containers made from high density polyethylene (HDPE) or polyethylene terephthalate (PET);  prepackaged foods in plastic; and compostable food service products the Department has verified as free of per and poly fluoroalkyl substances.

It can grant one year waivers from the requirements, and renew them, if applicants show that a restricted category of plastic food service product doesn’t have at least two suitable and readily commercially available alternative products; that there aren’t at least two vendors making a suitable alternative commercially available; or that enforcing the requirements would cause undue hardship.

The bill creates a fee of one cent per item on plastic food service items that aren’t recyclable or compostable; and a fee of up to one cent per item on ones that are, based on the average net cost of recycling or composting each material type and form, and the amount of it used in plastic food service products sold in the state. (I think this means that if it cost $1,000/ton to recycle some kind of item, and there were 10 tons sold in the state, then the fee per item should be set to cover the estimated cost of recycling all of them, or to collect a total of $10,000 in my example.) The fees are to be adjusted for inflation, and products covered by a statewide plastic packaging product stewardship program are exempted. The money can be spent on administering the program; for the State’s solid waste planning, management, regulation, enforcement, technical assistance, and public education; for assisting local solid waste programs, and for supporting statewide composting.

Ecology is to create education and outreach programs about these requirements, and can assess fines of up to $100 a day for violations of them for small retail food service businesses and up to $5,000 a day for larger ones.

In preparation for the 2030 statewide restrictions on plastic food service products, Ecology’s to report every two years on the status of composting infrastructure available to local jurisdictions, and on whether adjusting the State’s definition of “compostable” would help assure that those products could actually be composted and managed effectively by facilities.

The bill adds compostable food products to the items that local solid waste management plans have to consider, and requires them to assess the logistical and economic feasibility of developing infrastructure, including appropriate collection services, to allow widespread commercial composting of the organics and compostable food service products from their jurisdiction by 2030.