SWEEP Newsletter #28: EPR Bills Come Due as Markets and Capacity Shift
Packaging EPR is now a line item: AutoZone reports paying a combined $575,000 in Colorado EPR fees, and producers are back in court in Oregon ...
Rob Watson
SWEEP Newsletter #27: Waste System Structure Drives Costs
What waste programs cost depends less on the materials than on how the system is designed. California’s packaging EPR budget fell by as much as ...
SWEEP Newsletter #26: Landfills Gain and Recycling Slips: Will EPR Fill the Gap?
Sobering numbers from EREF regarding trends in waste generation and landfill disposal growth coupled with declining recycling of the waste generated, highlight the importance of ...
SWEEP Newsletter #25: Separation and Collection Remain the Principal Gates to Material Recovery Performance
Separating materials unlocks the value in discarded material streams. The principal structural questions revolve around “Who or what separates these materials, and when?” and “Where ...
SWEEP Newsletter #24: Growth and Change Are Challenging Waste Regulations and Infrastructure
Waste streams are changing faster than the systems built to manage them. The forecast AI buildout could create a growing stream of retired data center ...
SWEEP Newsletter #23: Batteries, Biogas and a Lighter Bin: Emerging Value Streams in Waste
Recent Congress and IRS actions have opened more opportunities to recover value from the waste stream. The House passed three bills that treat spent lithium-ion ...
SWEEP Newsletter #22: Come Together: Consolidating Industry Rules and Industry Players
Federal lawmakers, state legislators, and the industry’s largest haulers are all moving to bring more structure to a system that has long run on fragmented ...
SWEEP Newsletter #21: Two Sides of the Regulatory Coin: Leadership and Lagging
This week’s newsletter revisits the challenges the industry faces as regulations both lead and lag in key areas of rapidly evolving technologies and frameworks. Oregon’s ...
SWEEP Newsletter #20: Not Your Father’s Waste Management System
Happy September, everyone! The first SWEEP Newsletter of each month explores larger topics impacting the industry. This month we look at broader trends in organics ...
SWEEP Newsletter #19: Standardization’s Potential and Pitfalls; Look Ma! No Hands!
A new federal bill aims to close the gap between what recycled plastic content claims say and what can actually be verified, looking to bring ...
SWEEP Newsletter #18: New Restrictions, New Price Highs, New Leadership
This week’s articles highlight the difficulties in building markets for recovered materials, from the need for adequate infrastructure to process recovered materials, to restrictions on ...
SWEEP Newsletter #17: Landfill Operations Become More Challenging; Alternatives Get Investment
Landfills face increasing challenges both operationally and legally. In recent years, federal grants to support landfill methane reductions had been the norm, but the Washington ...