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History
- Referred to environmental conservation
- Referred to environmental conservation
Companion bill
The same bill in the other chamber. A bill becomes law when one version passes both houses and the governor signs it, so either number can carry it.
Relates to food service waste reduction
In Assembly Committee · Environmental Conservation · Sponsor Brian Kavanagh
Full text
The text isn't available here yet. Check nysenate.gov.
Sponsor's memo
BILL NUMBER:S2493
Title of bill
An act to amend the environmental conservation law, in relation to food service waste reduction
Purpose
The purpose of the bill is to discourage the use of disposable polystyrene foam food service ware by any person or entity that has a contract with an agency or municipality, and to study the feasibility of a polystyrene foam ban in New York State.
Summary of specific provisions
Requires that any state department, agency, board, public benefit corporation, public authority, commission, municipality, and their contractors and lessees use disposable food service ware made from material other than polystyrene foam, unless there is no compostable or recyclable alternative available at a price not more than 15 percent higher.
Requires the Department of Environmental Conservation to conduct a study on the desirability, feasibility and environmental impact of a statewide ban on the use of disposable polystyrene foam food service ware.
Effects of present law which this bill would alter
This bill would add a new title 28 to Article 27 of the Environmental Conservation Law.
Justification
Polystyrene foam is a liquid hydrocarbon that is commercially manufactured from petroleum, a quickly disappearing commodity. Each year Americans throwaway 25,000,000 polystyrene foam cups, or 1,369 tons of polystyrene products every day. A single polystyrene foam cup can take up to 500 years to fully disintegrate.
Polystyrene foam is a notorious pollutant that is very difficult to recycle due to its light weight and low scrap value. It is generally not accepted in curbside programs, is seldom able to be reused, takes up a considerable amount of space in landfills, and takes a very long time to fully decompose. Due to the physical properties of polystyrene foam, the United States Environmental Protection Agency states "that such materials can have serious impact on human health, wildlife, and the aquatic environment," because the product breaks and can clog waterways, or to be mistaken for food by wildlife.
One of the components of polystyrene foam, styrene is a known hazardous substance which was added to the list of U.S. Health Departments list of carcinogens in June of 2011. Many people do not realize that when they reheat food in a polystyrene foam product using a microwave, toxins may be released into their food. This bill would address the environmental impacts of Polystyrene foam while allowing
for exceptions in cases where there is no viable alternative product of comparable cost.
Fiscal impact on the state
Minimal.
Effective date
This act shall take effect immediately provided, however, that sections one and two of this act shall take effect on the one hundred twentieth day after it shall have become a law.
Summaries, headlines and scores are AI-generated from the official bill text. How we score bills. Source: NYS Open Legislation.