In California it’s relatively easy to recycle aluminum cans, newspapers, or glass bottles. But for one of the most commonly used household products — clothes — options are few.
Every year, millions of pounds of unwanted shirts, jeans, dresses, jackets and other garments end up in landfills across the state. Almost none are recycled. Some are donated to thrift stores, but thrift stores often re-sell many of them to companies that ship them to developing nations, like Ghana and Chile, where they are piled up in mountains as high as 50 feet tall in deserts and along rivers, causing massive waste problems.
On Friday, California lawmakers sent a bill to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s desk that would require clothing companies to set up the nation’s first mandatory take-back program for unwanted clothes.
If Newsom signs the bill, SB 707, as expected, companies that make clothing and other textiles sold in California, including drapes, sheets and towels, will be required to create a non-profit organization by 2026 that would put out bins, set up hundreds of collection sites at thrift stores, begin mail-back programs, and take other steps in all 58 of California’s counties to take back and recycle their products by 2030.
“All across America there are closets full of clothing that never gets worn,” said Mark Murray, executive director of Californians Against Waste, an environmental group based in Sacramento that supports the bill. “It is surrounding us. Look around your house. It’s the biggest waste problem that we’re ignoring.”
The accumulation of clothing waste is being made worse by “fast fashion,” a trend in which clothing companies make low-cost clothes intended to be worn only a few times as fashions shift.
“We have no use for things that aren’t in fashion, or don’t fit, or are worn out, and they often have no place left to go but the landfill,” Murray said.
The numbers are daunting.
In 2021, roughly 1.2 million tons of clothes and textiles were disposed of in California, according to the California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery, known as CalRecycle. Despite 95% of them being reusable or recyclable, only 15% are currently recycled or reused.
The bill is the latest in a trend where California lawmakers are increasingly requiring companies that make difficult-to-dispose-of products to take responsibility for recycling and reusing them, rather than leaving the cost and hassle up to local city and county governments.
One example: Under state law since 2018, consumers are charged $10.50 when they buy a new mattress in California. That money helps fund an industry-led program called the Mattress Recycling Council that has opened 240 collection sites and now recycles 85% of old mattresses in the state.
Similar “extended producer responsibility” programs with paint and carpet have been put in place in recent years. Newsom signed a landmark law in 2022 that will require the packaging industry to take back plastic packaging in the next few years.
The idea is to shift the burden away from consumers and government — …read more
Source:: The Mercury News – Entertainment
