EPA approximated it needs $40 billion to meet its goal for a 50 percent recycling rate by 2030, according to a recently published agency report.
Investments, which the agency projected would fall somewhere between $36 billion and $43 billion, would boost the number of curbside recycling projects and expand recycling infrastructure necessary to bring the nation’s recycling rate from 32 to 61 percent, according to the report.
But without standardized federal reporting requirements, that rate would still be based on incomplete data.
Only about half of U.S. states and territories measure an overall recycling rate, yielding a mean rate of 32 percent, according to a separate EPA report assessing data gaps.