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New Producer Responsibility Resources on CAA’s Website

CAA has enhanced its website to feature need-to-know information for those who are looking for key EPR implementation milestones and tracking where each state is in the regulatory process.

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Air Pollution Reduction in Colorado – Funding + Technical Support Opportunities

Air quality and climate action are a top priority in Colorado. The Colorado Energy Office (CEO) is implementing the Clean Air Program (CAP) to provide funding for project implementation and technical support to the industrial sector, including material recovery facilities, landfill operators, municipalities, and more, with the aim of reducing air pollution and decrease energy consumption. Here is a summary of the key offerings supplied by the program:

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Circular Action Alliance hosts webinar to discuss Colorado’s EPR program

Circular Action Alliance (CAA), HDR Engineering and Eunomia hosted a webinar yesterday to discuss Colorado’s extended producer responsibility (EPR) program for paper and packaging recycling. Haulers across Colorado were invited to the approximately 40-minute session to learn about the next steps in the implementation process and discuss the upcoming needs assessment period. 

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Let's Talk Boulder Podcast: No Waste in the First Place

Check out the Let's Talk Boulder Podcast hosted by the City of Boulder's Leah Kelleher. Take a listen to episode 5 as you are taken on a journey to prevent waste, give new life to old objects, and build an economic system that regenerates our planet instead of exploiting it. 
 
Special guests in this episode: 
  • Jamie Harkins, Sustainability Senior Manager for Circular Economies
  • Emily Freeman, Sustainability Policy Advisor
  • Michele Crane, Facilities Architectural Senior Manager

Listen to No Waste in the First Place

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Chaffee County Awarded $4 million EPA Grant for Recycling and Waste Diversion Facility

SALIDA, CO - The dream of a new recycling center and waste transfer station in Chaffee County is a major step closer to reality following today's announcement of a $4 million grant award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

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Proposed changes to the solid waste regulations regarding composting

The Solid Waste and Materials Management Program of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment is proposing changes to "Section 14 - Composting" of the Regulations Pertaining to Solid Waste Sites and Facilities, 6 CCR 1007-2 Part 1.

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Now accepting nominations for 2024 Recycle Colorado Board of Directors!

For the 2024 year, we are looking to fill 5 new board of director openings. We encourage members with varying backgrounds and perspectives to nominate themselves or someone they know for a position. Most board roles are filled by a member for three years, but if you are interested in a one year term, please let us know. 

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CDPHE Seeking Applicant for Producer Responsibility Advisory Board

The Producer Responsibility Program for Statewide Recycling is accepting applications for a vacancy on the Producer Responsibility Advisory Board. This individual will represent the manufacturer of recycled paper products seat and continue in a two-year term that ends in December of 2024. We are accepting applications until September 11 or until the seat is filled.

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John Giordanengo turned a business school revelation into research on two global systems

Recycle Colorado keynote speaker from the 2023 Summit for Recycling featured discussing his book in the Colorado Sun. Learn more on how John was inspired to write "Ecosystems As Models for Restoring Our Economies".

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Estes recycles to the max in record-breaking event

Estes Valley residents showed up in force on Saturday, August 12 to support Estes Recycles Day, with a record-breaking turnout of 504 cars and trucks unloaded at the Events Center parking lot.

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Why a Colorado mattress recycler sends old mattresses to the landfill

Spring Back Colorado, the Commerce City nonprofit, is desperately trying to figure out how to recycle pocket-coil mattresses affordably. It’s a challenge for the entire industry, even in states with mattress recycling laws.

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New Study on Food Residue Levels in Residential Recycling Stream

The Foodservice Packaging Institute, the trade association for the foodservice packaging industry in North America, recently commissioned an audit on materials in the residential recycling stream to determine whether levels of food residue on foodservice packaging (i.e., pizza boxes, paper and plastic cups, clamshells, and aluminum trays) differed from food residue levels on food contact packaging items (i.e., paper ice cream tubs, peanut butter jars, and food cans) that are traditionally included in recycling programs. The study found that a vast majority of food contact and foodservice items in the recycling stream were rated as a level 1 (defined as clean packaging with no food residue) or a level 2 (defined as, clean packaging, with some crumbs or staining from oils). Read the full study summary here: FPI Food Residue Study 2022

Circular Colorado awarded contract for the Circular Economy Development Center

Circular Colorado, a Colorado based nonprofit operated by previous Recycle Colorado staff members Laurie Johnson and Amy Randell, will help Colorado reach its waste diversion goals. By supporting and expanding Colorado's existing and new end markets for recycled materials, Circular Colorado hopes to increase the regional demand for materials. 

Read the full article on Circular Colorado & the CEDC

Learn more about Circular Colorado

The Potentially Everlasting Life of a Bottle

What happens to a bottle you toss in recycling? Does it get rinsed and refilled? Crushed and repurposed? Or end up in a landfill? Possibly any of those but it depends on where you live. Jamie Sudler of H2O Radio followed a beer bottle to find out what happens in Denver, Colorado.

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Learn more about Waste Interceptors

Philip Griffith is a new Recycle Colorado member, looking to make an impact in the state. Using his waste WIN -waste interception now - methodology he has been able to cut the waste bill on a test property in half. They have then invested that savings in recycling. It more than pays for itself. He could cut the waste bill in half again. One of the highlights, is the capacity to intercept shrink wrap and all forms of film, Styrofoam, pallets and just about anything that ends up in the dumpster but has a recycling answer.

Learn more about his processes by watching his Green Team video!

RFP Issued for Needs Assessment required by Colorado's Producer Responsibility Program

Circular Action Alliance has released a Request for Proposal (RFP) for parties interested in conducting the Needs Assessment required by Colorado’s Producer Responsibility Program for Statewide Recycling Act. The RFP is available on bidsUSA and closes on June 30, 2023.

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Compost Awareness Week Proclaimed in 2023

This year, Governor Jared Polis signed the proclamation to make May 7th-13th Compost Awareness Week in Colorado. Members of the Colorado Composting Council banded together to help write the proclamation and get it submitted. We are so proud to have a governor that supports our composting and recycling initiatives!

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CDPHE appoints first Producer Responsibility Organization in the nation for statewide recycling of packaging and paper

REMOTE (May 1, 2023): The Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment has appointed Circular Action Alliance as the Producer Responsibility Organization in charge of implementing Colorado’s new statewide recycling program created under the Producer Responsibility Program for Statewide Recycling Act. 

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Colorado's Youth Dig into their Creativity to Create Compost Art!

The 16th Annual Recycle Colorado Poster Contest kicked off in March this year and was very successful! This years theme was "Colorado Loves Clean Compost which asked students to help us illustrate why composting is important to our state and the people who live in it. We received over 160 poster submissions from 24 different school across the state. We love to see the creativity the kids bring each year, whether its from our up and coming digital graphic designers, or classic marker, paint and crayon artists, to the realists who used compostable and non-compostable items to demonstrate what they have learned. 

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Sowing seeds of self-growth: Muhammad Khan finds community in volunteering

DENVER — For Muhammad Khan, Colorado soil is a far more formidable foe than the loamy pastures of his home in Lahore, Pakistan. Still, welcoming the challenge, Khan flicks seeds over his green thumb onto the frozen topsoil of his backyard and hopes for the moisture of late March snows to brace his garden against the approaching summer sun.

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