EPA Pushes Use of Materials from Recovered Waste

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is revising the list of items designated in the Comprehensive Procurement Guidelines’ landscaping products category to promote the use of materials recovered from solid waste. EPA is expanding the description of “compost” from yard trimmings and food waste to include compost from biosolids and manure, but does not limit the designation to specific types of organic materials. In addition, EPA has added fertilizer made from recovered materials as a designated landscaping item.

The Resource Conservation and Recovery Act requires procurement officials to buy products containing recovered materials when the agencies spend more than $10,000 a year on that item. Procuring agencies are federal, state, and local agencies, and their contractors that use appropriated federal funds. For example, if a county agency spends more than $10,000 a year on an EPA-designated item and part of that money is from appropriated federal funds, then the agency must purchase that item made from recovered materials.

Agencies are required to purchase the product with the highest recovered material content level practicable, given reasonable competition, product price, performance, and availability. Through the CPG requirement, EPA is harnessing the purchasing power of the federal government to foster and support markets for recycled-content products, thereby reducing the need for raw materials, consumption of energy, and the release of greenhouse gas emissions. 

The rule should be published in the Federal Register within the next two weeks.

More on the Recovered Materials Advisory Notice (RMAN) that outlines changes to the list of items designated in the CPG landscaping products category:  http://www.epa.gov/epaoswer/non-hw/procure/rman5.htm

Information on EPA’s Comprehensive Procurement Guidelines Web site: http://www.epa.gov/cpg