VA Governor Orders Agencies To Stop Using Single-Use Plastics

RICHMOND, VA — Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam ordered all state agencies and public colleges and universities on Tuesday to stop using single-use plastics as part of an effort to reduce waste and a move toward a cleaner environment.

The executive order comes only days after Northam signed a bill that bans the use of polystyrene cups and takeout food containers. Under the bill, signed into law on March 18, food establishments with 20 or more locations cannot package and dispense food in single-use polystyrene containers as of July 2023. Remaining food vendors have until July 2025.

Northam announced the executive order on Tuesday during the 31st annual Environment Virginia Symposium on the campus of the Virginia Military Institute in Lexington.

Within 120 days of Northam’s executive order, all state agencies as well as state colleges and universities must stop buying, selling, or distributing certain items, including disposable plastic bags, single-use plastic and Styrofoam food service containers, plastic straws and cutlery, and single-use plastic water bottles, which are not biodegradable.

The Virginia agencies and schools can continue using the plastic and polystyrene products if they can show their use is for a medical, public health, or public safety reason. Also, a state agency can work with the director of the state Department of Environmental Quality on a phase-out plan that would give them an extra 18 months, or by Dec. 31, 2022, to stop using the type of plastics.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, less than 9 percent of plastics are recycled in the United States, compared with 91 percent disposed of in landfills or incinerators. Since 2011, solid waste disposed of at landfills and incinerators in Virginia has grown from 2 million tons to nearly 23 million tons per year.

“The Commonwealth of Virginia has a growing population and a growing economy that present significant challenges in managing solid waste,” the governor said in Tuesday's executive order.

Northam said in the executive order that many recycling programs in the state have curtailed or ceased operations since China stopped serving as a dumping ground for U.S. recyclables in 2018.

“Landfills or incinerators subject to strict environmental standards are the best option for waste that cannot currently be reused or recycled,” the executive order says. “Such facilities, however, — no matter how strictly regulated — have negative environmental and social impacts on nearby communities and siting often raises issues of environmental justice. Therefore, it is critical that the Commonwealth focus on reducing its disposal of solid waste, and diverting as much as possible from landfills to beneficial reuse.”

Within six months of the March 23 executive order, each state agency must develop a plastic pollution reduction plan to eliminate the buying, selling, or distribution of all nonmedical single-use plastic and expanded polystyrene objects, even those used for public health or public safety use.

These plans must include an inventory of all non-medical single-use plastic, polystyrene and expanded polystyrene foam items typically used by the agency, according to the order. Each state agency must determine replacement items that are reusable, compostable, or recyclable.

The agencies must set timelines for phasing out single-use items. According to Northam's executive order, the schedule for phasing out all non-medical single-use plastic, polystyrene and expanded polystyrene items is:

• 25 percent reduction by Dec. 31, 2022
• 50 percent reduction by Dec. 31, 2023
• 75 percent reduction by Dec. 31, 2024
• 100 percent reduction by Dec. 31, 2025

“Decades of experience have shown us that breaking our plastic addiction is the only truly effective pollution reduction strategy," Virginia Secretary of Natural Resources Matthew J. Strickler said Tuesday in a statement.

Single-use disposable plastic items pose a severe threat to fish and wildlife and the health of the Chesapeake Bay, according to the executive order. Plastics are the most pervasive type of marine debris in the ocean and along Virginia's coasts, it says.

In 2019, volunteers collected more than 12,000 plastics bags and 13,000 plastic bottles, in addition to many other types of debris, from Virginia’s coastline, according to the executive order.

"As a large producer of solid waste, the Commonwealth must lead by example and phase out its use of plastics and polystyrene items in favor of better alternatives," the executive order says. "The Commonwealth must also significantly reduce the amount of solid waste it sends to landfills and incinerators, and work with the private sector to do the same."