YOUR ADVOCACY MAKES A DIFFERENCE!

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Expanded Polystyrene is some particularly nasty stuff. It's a foam plastic made from toxic petrochemicals including benzene. It is not biodegradable nor compostable. Instead, it crumbles or photodegrades, breaking down into smaller and smaller toxic microplastic pieces, making it impossible to fully clean up once it is thrown away and escapes into our environment, and allowing it to easily migrate into our food chain and water supplies.

Polystyrene Foam is not accepted in curbside recycling. It's already banned in several other states including neighboring Maryland, Virginia, New Jersey, and D.C. because it's so harmful to our health and our environment.

Expanded Polystyrene foam is a human health & environmental justice issue. During the manufacturing process, workers exposed to styrene monomers have an increased risk of lymphoma, leukemia, and other forms of cancer. The industry ranks as the 5th largest creator of toxic wastes in the USA and these risks are especially prevalent in fenceline communities.

Expanded Polystyrene foam contributes to climate change. Single use plastic is derived from fossil fuel extraction and refining processes of oil and natural gas.

Polystyrene foam also makes its way into our storm drains and our waterways.  It pollutes our environment, harms animals, and increases cleanup costs. Once in the water it will absorb 10 times more pesticides, fertilizers and chemicals than other kinds of plastic, increasing toxin exposure to fish and other aquatic animals and on up the food chain.

Safer and more sustainable alternatives are readily available. It’s time to get polystyrene foam out of Delaware once and for all. 

CLICK BELOW to write to your Delaware State Representative today to ask them to protect us from expanded polystyrene by supporting a Senate Substitute 1 to Senate Bill 134 which was passed by the Delaware Senate on June 9th.

LEARN MORE HERE

TAKE ACTION: 

FIND YOUR DELAWARE LEGISLATORS HERE AND EMAIL OR CALL TO REQUEST THEIR SUPPORT OF HB22

 iFixit: The Free Repair Manual 

 Massachusetts Approves Second Right To Repair Initiative With Ballot Question 1

Right to Repair is the Last Stand in Big Tech Power Grab

John Deere Promised Farmers It Would Make Tractors Easy to Repair. It Lied. (vice.com) 

Delaware House Bill 22 was pre-filed in December 2020 to be worked in the coming 2021 Delaware legislative session.  It is a bi-partisan bill under Prime Sponsor Ruth Briggs King.  HB22 was released from the House Economic Development Committee and awaits a House floor vote.  Once enacted, the Right to Repair bill will serve to support small businesses in Delaware and provide local skilled jobs, while reducing the amount of electronics that prematurely become landfill fodder, and reducing carbon emissions by increasing the longevity of consumer products

Right to Repair Talking Points

Right to Repair is legislation that would…

1. Guarantee that individuals have property rights over their electronics, so that they can repair them if they want to. 
2. Ensure equal access to critical repair information (schematics and manuals) and fair and reasonable access to parts and tools.

Right to Repair is critical to waste prevention:

• E-waste is the fastest growing waste stream in the world. 
• Researchers estimate that e-waste is made up of 20% plastic, which is hard to recycle.  
• 416,000 cell phones are thrown out every day in the U.S.

If consumers had the right to repair their devices, the reuse of devices would reduce demand for natural resources.

• Americans purchase 161 million new smartphones each year, meaning our cell phone habit takes 23.7 million tons of raw material to satisfy. That’s like consuming an Empire State Building equivalent in material every six days.
• An iPhone 6 takes 295 lbs of raw minerals – 75 lbs of ore and 220 lbs water – to produce.

Right to Repair would help mitigate climate change by reducing the energy consumed in the manufacturing phase of production.

• 85% of the emissions impact of a smartphone comes from production.
• If we held unto phones one more year on average, the emissions reductions would be equivalent to taking 636,000 cars off the road. 
• One desktop uses up to 30 times its weight in fossil fuels.

Right to Repair would reduce the flow of toxic waste into landfills and incinerators. 

• E-waste accounts for 2% of the waste stream but 70% of it's toxicity.
• E-waste contains heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium.

Electronics recycling has not alleviated the problem of e-waste. 

• Only 36% of e-waste in the U.S. was recycled in 2017.

While informal recycling of e-waste recycling has been linked to increased cases of cancer and other illness, even formal e-waste recycling can lead to increased exposure to health-threatening toxic metals. 

September 30, 2021

In June, House Bill 212, as amended, was passed by the Delaware State House and Senate.  Special thanks are extended to the primary sponsors and leaders on the legislation, Rep. Gerald Brady, Rep. Valerie Longhurst, Rep. Eric Morrison, and Senator Kyle Gay.  Governor John Carney signed HB212 into law on September 30, 2021.

HB212 closes the inadvertent loophole created when 2019's HB130 law which went into effect on January 1st allowing plastic bags greater than 2.25 mils thick.  It now clarifies the definition of truly reusable bags, largely by the definition including requisite “stitched handles” following the model set by neighboring New Jersey.  HB212 also expands the law to all size stores and not just the largest retailers.  It will take effect July 1, 2022.

BACKGROUND FAQs:

• Less than 10% of the “single-use” plastic or film carryout bags actually get reused or properly recycled, they are still largely single-use and 90% end up in landfills or littering our communities and environment
• Single-use products such as plastic bags perpetuate a throwaway mindset and the extraction of oil and natural gas, and refining, with devastating environmental impacts to our air and water
• Although the bag law enacted in 2019 (HB130) went into effect 1/1/21, plastic bags continue to be found during Delaware beach cleanups.
• Plastic film bags continue to pollute our communities and the natural environment, harm animals, and contribute to the toxins which result when plastics break down and become part of our very own food chain.
• Recent studies show that these plastics – which do not biodegrade – break down into small microparticles which are now found in 90% of our table salt, in the fish we eat, and more.  It is estimated that humans are now consuming a credit card size amount of plastic every day. 
• DNREC and DSWA have seen a huge increase in these 2.25+ mil plastic film bags being put into curbside recycling since 1/1/21, thereby wreaking havoc at the Materials Recycling Facilities, causing delay and increased taxpayer expense as these facilities must shut down to clean out the plastic bags which clog the machinery.
• Many retailers already support the goal of this legislation by not providing plastic bags at all for free – including Aldi, Costco, Walmart, Dollar Tree and many more.  This legislation levels the playing field across Delaware, bringing fairness to all retailers.

It is estimated that more than 54% of the world's population is now covered under laws either completely banning plastic bag or laws placing fees on bags which greatly reduces their use but provides shoppers options and simply externalizes an existing cost.

In the U.S., California has passed a statewide law and Hawaii is fully covered by county laws.  Several other states are considering laws. Many other counties and cities also have laws banning or placing fees on single use plastic bags, including Washington D.C., Boston and Chicago.

HERE is a list of state and local laws in the U.S. And THIS SITE and THIS SITE also keep track of existing laws.