On November 21, 2024, the EPA released the “National Strategy to Prevent Plastic Pollution: Part Three of a Series on Building a Circular Economy for All,” which outlines opportunities for action to protect communities from the impacts of plastic production and waste and details how government agencies, businesses, nonprofits, and communities can take additional action to prevent plastic pollution.

Teerasak Ladnongkhun / Shutterstock.com

“EPA’s new strategy to prevent plastic pollution will have a profound impact on public health and our environment, especially in overburdened communities hit hardest,” said EPA Administrator Michael S. Regan in an Agency news release. “From reducing cancer-causing pollution from plastic manufacturing facilities, to increasing industry’s accountability to take back recycled plastic packaging, to capturing waste before it ends up in our bodies and the environment, this strategy lays out the path forward for EPA and our partners to tackle this persistent challenge.”

The strategy “presents a 10-year vision of opportunities for voluntary and regulatory actions that can be taken by businesses; nongovernmental organizations; federal, Tribal, state, local, and territorial governments; academia; and consumers,” according to the strategy executive summary webpage. “Together, these U.S. entities could eliminate the release of plastic waste from land and sea-based sources into the environment by 2040.

“The opportunities for action in this strategy are designed to combat climate change through greenhouse gas emission reductions associated with the lifecycle of plastic products and to reduce public health impacts to communities overburdened by pollution.”

Nano- and microplastics

Research has found nano- and microplastics in many parts of the human body, including breast milk and human placentas after birth, even following a plastic-free birthing protocol.

“Studies show micro- and nanoplastics negatively impact fertility and reproductive health; potentially put people at a higher risk for heart attack, stroke, or death; and that some micro- and nanoplastics may contribute to the progression of colorectal cancer,” the EPA release continues. “In addition, some studies raise concerns about endocrine-disrupting effects from chemicals that leach out of plastic products, and whether some plastic polymers cross the blood-brain barrier. There are growing concerns associated with potential threats to children’s health from micro- and nanoplastics.”

National Strategy to Prevent Plastic Pollution—Part 3

The EPA received almost 92,000 comment letters from industry and trade organizations, national and community-based nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), academia, government agencies (e.g., federal, tribal, state, and local), and private individuals when it released its Draft National Strategy to Prevent Plastic Pollution in April 2023. Using this input, the EPA identified six main objectives that address plastic pollution throughout the life cycle of plastic products. Each objective identifies multiple action steps to achieve that goal.

Objectives and action steps

Reducing pollution from plastic production operations in the United States is essential to minimizing the environmental and human health impacts of plastic on communities, particularly those with environmental justice concerns.

• Conduct evaluations to ensure fossil fuel extraction facilities, as well as petrochemical and plastic production facilities, comply with regulatory requirements.
• Continue to make progress reviewing and, where appropriate, updating regulations for fossil fuel extraction, petrochemical, and plastic production facilities and transporters of plastic pellets and plastic additives.
• Explore creating a voluntary certification to recognize plastic products that are manufactured under rigorous environmental standards.
• Identify and reduce environmental injustice and public health impacts from fossil fuel extraction, petrochemical, and plastic production facilities.

Plastic products and packaging have become increasingly complex and aren’t always designed to be sustainably managed once they become waste. Products and systems should be designed to minimize negative human health and environmental impacts.

• Identify alternative materials, products, or systems that can minimize impacts on human health and the environment.
• Review, develop, update, and use sustainability standards, ecolabels, certifications, and design guidelines that can minimize the negative impacts to human health and the environment from plastic products across their life cycle.

Circular approaches are needed to reduce the rates of plastic production and consumption and decrease waste generation to reduce the human health and environmental impacts of plastic products throughout the plastics life cycle.

• Reduce the production and consumption of single-use plastic products.
• Enhance the effectiveness of existing public policies and incentives for decreasing plastic waste generation.
• Develop and expand the capacity to reuse materials.
• Increase public understanding about the impacts of plastic pollution (including on waterways and the ocean) and how to appropriately manage plastics and other materials.

Improvements to the collection, transportation, and export of waste are needed so it doesn’t enter the environment.

• Explore possible ratification of the Basel Convention, and encourage environmentally sound management of scrap and recyclables traded with other countries.
• Support state, local, tribal, and territorial governments in their efforts to improve waste management to avoid adverse human health and environmental impacts, especially for communities with environmental justice concerns.
• Develop a national extended producer responsibility framework.
• Facilitate more effective composting of certified compostable products.

Interventions to capture and remove plastic pollution, including nano-/microplastic pollution, from wastewater, stormwater, and surface waters are needed to help address potential risks to human and ecosystem health. Such interventions are especially important given the expected increase in plastic production over the coming years.

• Identify and implement policies and programs that effectively remove plastics and other materials from the environment, including waterways and the ocean.
• Improve water management to increase the capture and removal of plastics and other materials from waterways, the ocean, and stormwater/wastewater systems.

Research and increased access to public and private funding are needed to measure the contributions of plastic pollution, including nano-/microplastics, in waterways and the ocean and study the potential human health impacts of exposure to plastic pollution. Reliable baseline measurements of plastics and other materials in waterways and the ocean can be used to measure the success of mitigation efforts over time.

• Increase and improve the measurement of plastic and other material loadings in waterways and the ocean to inform management interventions.
• Increase and coordinate research on methods to determine nano-/microplastic prevalence, impacts, and mitigation.
• Increase and coordinate research on macroplastic transport, degradation, and impacts on waterways and the ocean.

The actions outlined in this strategy are in addition to measures already in place to reduce plastic waste:

• The EPA’s Trash Free Waters Program will strengthen its emphasis on preventing trash from entering the environment, removing trash in and around waterways, and disseminating research findings.
• The EPA set enforceable wastewater standards for industry and has developed national water quality criteria recommendations for pollutants in surface waters. In 2024, the EPA finalized new requirements for facilities to develop and submit response plans for worst-case discharges of hazardous substances under the Clean Water Act (CWA), including many chemicals used in plastic manufacturing.
• The EPA’s Environmental Justice Grants and Technical Assistance Program offers a variety of funding opportunities for projects that focus on plastic pollution reduction.
• In addition, the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law provided the EPA with funding to support implementing this strategy through the Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling and Recycling Education and Outreach grant programs. This includes funding for improvements to reuse and recycling infrastructure, for education and outreach, and for waste reduction plans.
• The EPA launched a new platform containing the initial actions it’s taking to implement its series of strategies on “Building a Circular Economy for All.”

This part of the national strategy was released just before the final meeting of the International Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution, which began on November 25, 2024, in Busan, South Korea. The purpose of this committee is to produce an international legally binding contract on plastic pollution.

Through the 2020 Save Our Seas 2.0 Act, Congress charged the EPA with developing a strategy to reduce plastic waste and other post-consumer materials in waterways and oceans. The National Strategy to Prevent Plastic Pollution is in response to that congressional directive.

“The ‘National Strategy to Prevent Plastic Pollution’ follows the ‘National Strategy for Reducing Food Loss and Waste and Recycling Organics’ and builds on EPA’s ‘National Recycling Strategy’ by identifying actions needed to reduce and recover plastic and other materials, as well as prevent plastic pollution from harming human health and the environment,” according to the EPA’s news release. “These actions support a circular economy approach to the management of plastic products—an approach that is regenerative by design, ensuring resources retain value for as long as possible. It aligns with the White House’s 2024 Report: Mobilizing Federal Action on Plastic Pollution: Progress, Principles, and Priorities, which presents a plan for federal action.

“The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development projects that, without interventions, global plastic use and waste will almost triple by 2060. Because most plastic products are not reused or recycled, many will end up incinerated, disposed of in landfills, or ‘leaked’ into the environment, negatively impacting human health and ecosystems. Plastic products also contribute to global greenhouse gas emissions, and there are significant human health concerns associated with plastic pollution across the lifecycle of plastic products. These concerns impact many fence line communities, disproportionally low-income and communities of color, near plastic, chemical and petrochemical processing facilities.”

Next steps

Strategy implementation is expected to be continuously adjusted as resources, entities leading efforts, and needs change over time.

“EPA will continue to enable and implement this strategy and EPA-specific opportunities for action in the White House’s ‘Mobilizing Federal Action on Plastic Pollution: Progress, Principles, and Priorities,’ using both voluntary efforts and regulatory approaches, where appropriate,” the EPA Executive Summary webpage says. “This includes, for example, using the Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling grant program to support implementation of this strategy, as required by the Save Our Seas 2.0 Act. EPA will also provide periodic updates on the implementation of this strategy.”

Much of the current administration’s focus on plastic pollution has been due to the Biden-Harris commitment to working with the global community to put international agreements in place to reduce pollution and emissions. However, President-Elect Donald Trump is unlikely to support any measures that involve multinational agreements or reducing production.