DEEP-Supported Bill Aims to Regulate Packaging

Companies that manufacture consumer goods in Connecticut, retailers that sell them, and consumers who buy them all face higher costs if the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, through SB 233, gets the ability to adopt regulations creating standards and requirements for the management of consumer packaging—including business-to-business shipping.
All of that is far beyond the original concept of SB 233, which was simply to foster a legislative discussion about the issue of consumer packaging, and explore possible legislative options.
As the New Haven Register said in an editorial earlier this year, “The General Assembly should take a closer look at packaging waste and consider all the possibilities [for reducing consumer packaging in the waste stream].”
CBIA agreed, in its public hearing testimony, urging policymakers to first understand the issue better, and then explore potential policy options.

Giant Leap

Efforts to reduce various components of our waste stream, CBIA noted in the testimony, “are most successful when the nature and extent of the wastes in question, as well as their actual and potential value as a commodity in the marketplace, are fully understood.”

Unfortunately, the version of SB 233 ultimately approved by the General Assembly's Environment Committee takes a giant leap over analysis and consideration of policy options, and hands DEEP the authority it needs to adopt its preferred option of having manufacturers and/or retailers (and ultimately consumers) pay fees to support a regulatory bureaucracy with mandates that include:

• Reduction in volume and weight of consumer packaging (CP) in the waste stream
• Increasing the recyclability of CP
• Increasing the proportion of recycled materials used in the manufacturing of CP
• Requiring labeling of CP
• Standards for refillable and reusable CP
• Packaging standards
• Prohibiting or reducing the use of certain substances in CP
• Performance targets and parameters for verification of reductions in CP of not less than 50% by 2024.

Adopting SB 233 would be a major setback for those seeking to improve Connecticut’s image as place for businesses to locate, expand, and grow jobs.
CBIA strongly urges Connecticut state lawmakers to reject the regulatory approach of SB 233 in favor of a process that fully explores the nature of the issue and produces several strategic options including non-regulatory options, for the General Assembly to consider next session.

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For more information, contact CBIA’s Eric Brown (860.244.1926) | @CBIAericb