With annual plastic pollution predicted to nearly double by 2040, Beyond Plastics expressed hope on Wednesday that the next US president “is ready to take on the challenge,” and unveiled a 27-point policy guide to guide the winner of November's election.
“The next U.S. president should implement a combination of approaches to significantly reduce the production, use, transportation, and waste of plastics in the interest of public health and the environment,” the proposed list of priorities states. “This will include directives issued to federal agencies and efforts to work with Congress to introduce and pass relevant federal legislation.”
The group announced the agenda as countries including the United States prepare to join talks in November to finalize a global plastics treaty, which aims to reduce the 15 million tons of plastic that enters the oceans each year and cut human exposure to thousands of hazardous chemicals used to make plastic.
Judith Enck, president of Beyond Plastics, said the next U.S. president “has an opportunity and a responsibility to put people and planet above industry profits and finally ask companies to stop using harmful plastics.”
Beyond Plastics' priorities include steps that federal agencies should take to reduce plastic pollution in the U.S. and abroad, as well as legislation that Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris or Republican candidate Donald Trump should urge Congress to pass.
Beyond Plastics' proposed executive actions include:
- Suspension of new or renewed permits for oil refineries, petrochemical plants, and other facilities that produce plastics and their precursors.
- A national moratorium on the construction of chemical recycling facilities that emit hazardous waste, toxic air pollutants, and greenhouse gases and are primarily located in environmental justice communities.
- It will ban the shipping of plastic waste to other countries, after 900 million pounds of plastic was exported overseas in 2023.
- An Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ban on vinyl chloride, a carcinogenic chemical that posed a public health hazard in the 2023 Norfolk Southern Railroad derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.
- Department of Justice investigations into the plastics industry's health impacts on communities near processing and manufacturing plants, its role in polluting public lands, “false and misleading claims about the recyclability and recycled content of plastics,” and plastic pollution in waterways and oceans.
- With the Department of Labor's leadership, we will provide job training and employment opportunities for plastics workers to ensure a “just transition.”
The group also called on the next administration to push for passage of a “Strong National Packaging Reduction Act” that would mandate a 50% reduction in plastic packaging over 10 years, the Free from Plastic Pollution Act, the “Styrofoam Elimination Act” that would phase out plastic Styrofoam food containers, single-use Styrofoam picnic coolers and packaging “peanuts,” and legislation that would allow local governments, states and businesses to apply for federal funding to develop waste reduction, reuse and refill programs.
“The next US president should combine a range of approaches to dramatically reduce the production, use, transportation and waste of plastics in the interest of public health and the environment.”
Enck said the average American produces 200 pounds of plastic waste per year and that the U.S. currently “produces more plastic waste than any other country, and very little is being done to change that.”
Hannah Storey Brown, a researcher at the Revolving Door Project, noted that after Beyond Plastics released its priority list, as California's attorney general, Harris “filed a first-of-its-kind greenwashing lawsuit in 2011 against plastic bottle companies that claimed their products were biodegradable.”
“The Harris Department of Justice can and should do more to combat the misleading marketing of this harmful industry,” Brown said.
In contrast, Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), a co-sponsor of the Break Free from Plastic Pollution Act and a member of the U.S. delegation to global plastics treaty negotiations, said:POLITICO Earlier this year he warned that “in the unlikely scenario of a second term for President Trump, no progress will be made on plastics.”
Mario Loyola, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation who served as deputy director for regulatory reform during Trump's term in office, told the outlet that Republican candidates are likely to be “skeptical” about whether the plastic pollution reduction treaty “was the best deal that could be achieved.”
“When the new president takes office in January, I will urge him to transform America from a leader in creating plastic pollution to a leader in fighting it,” Enck said.