Colorado’s new Compostable Product Labeling Act is here!

Let’s be real: We’ve all wondered if the “bioassimable” bowl and “biodegradable” fork at the neighborhood street fair is actually compostable. (Pro tip: If Scraps is at the event,we’ve ensured vendors are using only approved compostable products, and we’ll have associates on site to help you sort waste into appropriate streams!) 

The harsh truth is that a lot of food service products currently labeled as “compostable” are not actually certified or approved compostable. These products wind up in the dump, or they wind up contaminating our region’s compost stream. 

Colorado’s trying to change that. As of July 1, 2024, the Centennial State joined California and Washington state in getting legislation on the books aimed at cleaning up contamination in compost streams through better product labeling.  

The state’s new Compostable Product Labeling Act “requires food service products and plastic products labeled as compostable sold or distributed in Colorado to be certified compostable and to be clearly marked as such,” according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE) website.

Brandon Ingersoll, CDPHE marketing and communications specialist, says the act came about because so much non-compostable food service ware and packaging was winding up in compost streams, “in part because of a lack of clear labeling.” Ingersoll says this “absence of clarity” resulted in a number of negative consequences including confusion and excessive cost burden to consumers; increased costs and operational challenges for compost manufacturers; contamination in compost streams; and reduced value of finished compost, or even a completely unmarketable finished product. 

Compost contamination got so bad in Colorado that the state’s largest commercial composting facility, our friends and partners at A1 Organics, banned any material other than yard waste and food scraps in April 2023. The ban, which is still in effect today, includes paper and compostable products, even those labeled as certified compostable. (A1 has provided carve-outs and occasional pilots for small companies like Scraps, who invests heavily in contamination reduction efforts, to bring their organic material to A1 — including compostable products.) Consumer confusion leading to contamination, combined with the lack of product labeling standards, is still too big a burden for processors like A1 to manage. There’s hope that the new Labeling Act will help turn the tide on this problem.

But compost contamination isn’t totally our fault when there’s limited public education and “so much greenwashing in disposable packaging,” says Meghan Ibach, product and zero waste specialist at Eco-Products, a Boulder-based company that produces renewable and post-consumer recycled foodservice packaging. 

“There’s no consistency in what some terminology means, or what [products] look like,” Ibach explains. “You can put Earths, moons, stars and planets on [a] cup, but it’s actually a paper cup lined in petroleum-based plastic (which isn’t compostable). But as a consumer, how do I know?”

This is where the Compostable Product Labeling Act comes into play. Now, all food service and plastic products sold in Colorado can only legally be characterized as compostable if they meet these criteria:

The product is compostable by ASTM International D6400 or ASTMD6868 standards. (Learn more here; but essentially these are compostability standards tested under controlled conditions.)

The product must be immediately distinguishable as certified compostable upon quick inspection. The product must display:
…A certification logo that indicates certified compostable.
…The world “compostable” where possible.
…Green symbols, colors, tinting, marks or design patterns.

Small products of one-half inch or less of printable surface space (like straws) must only meet one of three of the above requirements. Compostable products must not display a “chasing arrow” to avoid consumer confusion, Ingersoll explains. (Fun fact: this design that folks tend to think of as a “recycling symbol” is simply a resin identification code to indicate the type of plastic an item is made of.) These requirements do not apply to products composed entirely of untreated wood, including fiber-based substrates — think coffee stirrers or chopsticks. 

Producers of non-certified compostable products are prohibited from using misleading labeling that could imply the product is compostable. So if Colorado consumers — regular folks like you and me — an item for sale labeled as biobased, plant-based, eco-friendly, or some other vague and greenwash-y term — may file a complaint against a producer in possible violation of the Compostable Product Labeling Act via the online Composting Labeling Complaint Form.

According to Ingersoll, the act authorizes CDPHE “to evaluate complaints and determine whether a product is out of compliance with the compostable product labeling requirements. If a product does not meet the labeling requirements, staff refer the complaint to the Attorney General’s Office.” From there, the AG’s Office determines enforcement, and also has the authority to request compliance records from producers.

While the Compost Labeling Act is universally seen as positive, Milena Kothe, general manager of Denver food packaging merchandiser EP Distribution, says she feels the legislation is “somewhat skipping a step” because so few people — residents and businesses — actually have the opportunity to compost. Not all municipalities contract with a waste service that picks up compost, nor do all landlords provide composting bins on their property. On top of that, A1 Organics still isn’t accepting anything other than food and yard waste, leaving limited options for where to send compostable food service wares. 

“Our customers are like, ‘Well, I have limited to no opportunities to actually compost this item, so why should I pay more or add to compliance when Colorado hasn’t solved for the fact that we can’t compost?’” Kothe says. “Additionally, [the law asks] manufacturers [to] spend thousands of dollars on new plates [to print packaging] to meet just a Colorado-specific labeling standard.” Kothe says overseas manufacturers are scrambling to meet standards that vary not only between countries, but between states in the same nation. 

A better first step, Kothe believes, is providing affordable composting options for everyone, including incentivization for restaurants, hotels, gyms, bars and similar establishments to invest in compostable materials and composting pick-up service. Thankfully there’s more legislation in the works to help address this: Colorado’s new Extended Producer Responsibility bill (or EPR, which we’ll cover in detail in a future post!). It’s a step or two behind on timing — the Extended Producer Organization, or PRO, is deep in the stakeholder engagement and rulemaking process for this bill — but in the next few years, EPR implementation will result in funding available to public and private entities to do just that.

In the meantime, the City & County of Denver’s new Waste No More initiative hit the ground earlier in 2024; by the end of 2025, all commercial entities and permitted events in Denver will have to provide composting (and recycling) in accordance with this initiative. The City is expected to roll out limited financial support programs for businesses that could benefit from a bit of help in coming into compliance. 

Kothe, Ibach and Ingersoll — and our team here at Scraps — are all hopeful that Colorado, California and Washington state’s compost product labeling laws are the beginning of a chain reaction for the whole country.

“We really do need a paradigm shift,” Ibach says. “Only [about] 25% of the stuff we throw away is actually truly waste, at least in today’s terms. Organics, food scraps,

paper products, aluminum, glass, these are precious resources, and when people can work together to build a better, more efficient system, we can capture and preserve these precious resources.”