Oregon standardizes what can be recycled. Here’s what you need to know

• Oregon now accepts standardized list of recyclable materials covering paper, metal, plastic.
• New recycling system meant to increase opportunities for recycling, upgrade systems.
• Oregon Department of Environmental Quality said Oregon “first state in the nation to implement a law like this.”

Sweeping changes to recycling in Oregon went into effect July 1. The changes are part of Oregon’s Plastic Pollution and Recycling Modernization Act, which the state legislature passed in 2021. The new rules are meant to make it easier to recycle, expand access to recycling services and upgrade the facilities that sort recyclables.

Here’s what you need to know.

What can be recycled in Oregon?

The act replaced lists of acceptable recyclable materials that were previously set at a local level with the Uniform Statewide Collection List. Going forward, all curbside recycling in Oregon must now collect:

• Corrugated cardboard, including clean pizza boxes.
• All kraft paper, such as brown paper bags.
• Paperboard packaging, such as cereal boxes.
• Molded pulp packaging, such as egg cartons.
• Polycoated cartons and aseptic cartons, such as milk cartons.
• Tissue paper used as packaging (not facial or sanitary tissue).
• Non-metalized gift wrap (no ribbons or bows).
• High-grade office paper.
• Newspapers.
• Magazines and similar glossy paper.
• Telephone directories.
• Paperback books.
• “Other paper” such as envelopes, junk mail’ and greeting cards.
• Aluminum food and beverage cans.
• Steel cans, including empty/dry paint cans.
• Scrap metal less than 10 pounds in weight and 18 inches in length. But not sharp items or items that can get tangled in sorting equipment such as bicycle chains and wires.
• Plastic tubs, such as for cottage cheese, larger than 2 inches in two dimensions.
• Plastic bottles larger than 2 inches in two dimensions.
• Plastic buckets, pails, storage containers and other plastic packaging that fit loosely in the provided on-route collection.
• Plastic plant packaging.
  • The plastic items must be PET, HDPE or polypropylene. Which are labeled as #1, #2 or #5 on the recycling triangle included on recyclable plastics.

Glass still needs to be recycled separately in a glass-only bin or brought to a drop-off site. All items must be empty, dry and placed loose into recycling containers. Do not bag recyclables. Lane County’s Waste Wise tool allows residents to look up which materials are accepted.

Alex Bertolucci, spokesperson for Circular Action Alliance, the organization the state selected to implement many of the changes, said some of the transition will be gradual. For example, much of southern Oregon will adopt the new list “pretty soon.”

Lane County and Eugene governments said locally, the statewide list was in effect as of July 1. Food and beverage cartons, delivery pizza boxes and round plastic containers such as margarine tubs, plant pots and buckets are all items that weren’t accepted in curbside recycling in Lane County before but are now. Eugene said foil products and empty aerosol containers were previously accepted but no longer will be.

How the new recycling system will work

Producers of packaging, printed paper, food serviceware and printing and writing paper must now pay fees to the CAA which will use the money to compensate local governments for the costs of expanded recycling.

Bertolucci said recycling sorting facilities going forward must follow standards in line with the new list, and CAA is helping them make those changes.

CAA is also responsible for tracking recyclables, reporting where they go and ensuring materials “actually get recycled,” said Arianne Sperry, the DEQ’s implementation lead for the Recycling Modernization Act.

“We’ll be running an audit center,” Bertolucci said. “We’ll be actually looking at what goes into the recycling bin and what kind of contamination there is there and how we can address that in our education.”

Nicole Portley, DEQ’s plan lead for the act, said ensuring materials get sorted at the local level is relatively easy and has been accomplished in other states. Oregon’s law also includes the end market with the goal of addressing some of the waste trade scandals from the 2010s.

Bertolucci said it’s a misconception that most waste is recycled oversees, and since China stopped taking plastic in 2017-18, local governments have taken steps to reduce recycling contamination, helping to make recycling economical enough to be done in North America. The Recycling Modernization Act was another step in that direction.

“We hope that this new education and outreach material that we’re developing, and single statewide list of what’s accepted, will really help folks better understand how to recycle and what those right items are to put in.”

Drop-off locations to come

More specialized materials, such as stretchy plastics, plastic lids and large appliances, will be able to be recycled at designated locations. According to CAA, these “RecycleOn Oregon Recycling Centers,” will start to come online in late summer or early fall.

CAA’s draft plan lists 17 locations in Lane County that could potentially serve as recycling centers: Lane County’s Transfer stations in Glenwood, Cottage Grove and Florence; 10 St. Vincent De Paul locations in Eugene, Springfield, Cottage Grove, Florence and Junction City; two Waste Connections locations in Eugene; Bring Recycling in Eugene; and Cottage Grove Recycling.

As the Recycling Modernization Act is rolled out, information will be posted at recycleon.org/oregon.

Alan Torres covers local government for the Register-Guard. He can be reached over email at atorres@registerguard.com or on X @alanfryetorres.