The Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Bill needs to pass this spring

As the policy director at Beyond Plastics, I get asked the same two questions on repeat: “How do you get through life, knowing what you do?” and “What can I do to help?”

At the moment, the answer to those two questions is the same: New York State is on the verge of passing one of the most forward-looking plastics reduction laws anywhere in the country, and real change may be tantalizingly close. Where voluntary pledges, litter clean-ups, and even recycling have failed, this law could move the needle to reduce harmful plastics at their source. Every day, from now until the New York legislative session ends next week, New Yorkers should pick up the phone and call their state senator and assembly person and urge them to pass The Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Bill (S4246/A5322).

The plastic pollution crisis is deeper and faster-moving than most of us realized even a handful of years ago. We knew that plastic was an “oceans problem” and a “litter problem.” But as it turns out, it is also a human health problem, which adds a new level of urgency. I spent much of the past year working with an international team of scientists putting together a comprehensive picture of the impact of plastics on human health, and the findings were alarming.

Most people have heard of microplastics. Plastic is so durable that instead of breaking down after use it breaks up into tinier and tinier pieces. Under the microscope, plastics have been found nearly everywhere researchers have looked: in drinking water, air, rainwater, agricultural soil, seafood, and in our own bodies. It’s been identified in human lung tissue, intestinal tissue, veins, breast milk, blood, and even the placenta. What it is doing there is the subject of concern.

Plastic is made with thousands of chemicals. When microplastics penetrate human tissue the fragments act like tiny Trojan horses, leaching chemicals known to cause cancer, disrupt brain development, and mix up hormonal systems all over the body. They are associated with conditions such as ADHD, autism spectrum disorders, obesity, diabetes, infertility, and prostate, breast, and testicular cancers. They are especially dangerous for infants in the womb, young children, and pregnant women. They are difficult to avoid because there is so much plastic already in existence, and virtually no regulation on how much more we make and what chemicals are used.

New York State is no stranger to microplastics. We produce nearly 7 million tons of plastic packaging waste per year, which is about 40% of our state’s waste stream. Since most of it is unrecyclable, a good deal of it winds up in landfills, in incinerators, in the environment, and potentially in us.

But now for the good news. This is a solvable problem. We have stopped similar crises in the past. We removed lead from gasoline, and drew down the chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) that were poking holes in the ozone layer.

So, what would this bill do? First, it would require companies to cut their single-use packaging in half over the next 12 years. Then, it would require companies to make all of their remaining packaging recyclable and safer by eliminating 12 toxic chemicals from packaging — including PFAS, lead, cadmium, formaldehyde and halogenated flame retardants — all currently found in packaging. Finally, it would make the companies that put packaging on the market responsible for its recycling after it’s discarded — saving millions of New York tax dollars.

If this bill passes in New York State, it will go a long way toward pulling plastic out of the waste stream, the environment, and possibly us.

Now for the even better news: New Yorkers are in a strategic position to get the ball rolling nationwide. New York State is one of the largest and most powerful packaging markets in the country. When our standards change, manufacturers are forced to alter their product design to comply, or risk losing market share, which means the improved design ripples out to other states. Moreover, legislation that passes here undergoes such a gauntlet of scrutiny that other states often look to it for models. What happens here opens the door to what happens elsewhere, and we are on the verge of getting this right.

You are a bigger and more important part of the solution to plastic waste and contamination than you ever dreamed possible. The legislative session ends for the year on June 8, so we don’t have much time. Use your power. Find your state lawmakers at openstates.org/ny/legislators/ and reach out.

Wolff is the policy director of Beyond Plastics, an environmental advocacy group that aims to end plastic pollution everywhere.