President Joe Biden's administration on Friday announced plans to phase out single-use plastics in all federal operations by 2035, as part of a broader effort to combat what it deemed a rising global crisis.
A White House report released July 19 calls for phasing out single-use plastics in foodservice operations, events and packaging across the federal government by 2027, as part of much broader calls for government to do more.
Biden aides said that could include working to reduce global production and consumption of virgin plastics.
The report, "Mobilizing Federal Action on Plastic Pollution: Progress, Principles and Priorities," says it's the first time the federal government is ‘formally acknowledging the severity of the plastics pollution crisis’.
"Plastic production and waste have doubled over the past two decades, littering our ocean, poisoning the air of communities near production facilities, and threatening public health," the administration said in a statement.
The 83-page report, released under embargo by the White House, recaps previous actions by the Biden administration, like regulations limiting toxic emissions from factories, reducing plastics use in national parks and funding recycling infrastructure.
But it also includes a shopping list of other actions government could take and it employs expansive language, such as echoing calls in the ongoing global plastics treaty talks to reduce production and consumption of virgin plastics.
"The president is committed to taking ambitious actions throughout the full life cycle of plastics to end plastic pollution and is calling upon the global community to do the same, with the goal to reduce the global production and consumption of virgin plastics," according to a letter released with the report from Brenda Mallory, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, and Ali Zaidi, Biden's climate adviser.
The report did not include any details on how to reduce global plastics production.
Mallory and Zaidi co-chair the administration's Interagency Policy Committee on Plastic Pollution and a Circular Economy, which released the report. Biden formed the committee in April 2023 to coordinate executive branch actions.
The two senior Biden administration officials wrote that the administration's actions thus far amount to "early steps," with the report outlining other regulations that could be updated.
"These early steps are important for building momentum for the scale of action and progress needed across all levels of government to address plastic pollution and its associated impacts," they said.
"Tackling plastic pollution and its associated impacts will require unprecedented action at every stage of the plastics life cycle — from reining in the pollution from petrochemical production that is poisoning communities and driving climate change to reorienting infrastructure to ensure dramatic increases in recycling and reuse, to investing in innovative materials to replace the pervasive use of plastics in our society," Mallory and Zaidi said.
Plastics industry groups criticised the Biden report for the "false pretence" that alternatives to plastics have a lower environmental impact.
"We are disappointed in today's White House announcement, which arbitrarily singles out plastic under the false pretence of a lower environmental impact," said Matt Seaholm, president and CEO of the Plastics Industry Association. "The [association] and its member companies are dedicated to keeping plastic waste out of the environment, and we continue to collaborate with policymakers at all levels of government to achieve this goal.”
The report's most concrete new action could be its call to phase out federal procurement of single-use plastics in food service operations, events, and packaging by 2027 and to remove them from all federal operations by 2035.
The move follows the Biden-Harris administration's 2022 decision to phase out single-use plastics in national parks and public lands.
The US federal government is the single largest buyer of goods and services in the world. Any decision to reduce and ultimately ban its use of single-use plastics could have a significant impact on global markets.
The report said the decision would help agencies meet Biden's executive orders around clean energy and federal sustainability, which called for phasing out single-use plastics procurement by 2050.
"Meeting the new goal by selecting reusable, compostable and highly recyclable products in lieu of single-use plastics in foodservice will further agencies' obligations under the Executive Order," the White House said in a fact sheet distributed with the report.