EPR Tool Kit
Producer Takeback for Discarded Products Promoted to Save Governments, Taxpayers Money
Our Tool Kit Is Now Available to Help Governments, Communities Learn How to Save Money and Produce Less Toxic Waste
Clean Production Action has produced a tool kit that helps local governments and communities implement Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR).
EPR is a system in which manufacturers — not the consumer or government — take responsibility for reusing and recycling their products when the product is no longer useful or discarded. When the manufacturer is responsible, the cost of waste management becomes incorporated into the cost of the product and is borne by the user and the producer, rather than taxpayers as a whole, which is now the case.
Traditionally, recycling has been part of the answer to the growing waste problem, but since 1997 recycling in the U.S. has stagnated at 27 percent and for some materials the rate is extremely low. Plastics recycling still only accounts for less than five percent of recycled products because many types of plastic are too difficult to recycle.
The EPR Tool Kit includes the following information:
- What is EPR?
- How EPR can help solve the waste problem in North America
- How EPR benefits local governments, taxpayers and businesses
- What to include in an EPR program
- How to implement an EPR program
- How to promote EPR
- Existing EPR campaigns and who to contact to learn more
- Examples of EPR programs in North America and abroad
Download the tool kit files:
EPR Tool Kit (black & white) (PDF)
EPR Tool Kit (color) (PDF)
Supplemental CD Files (.zip collection of PDFs)
