House subcommittee hears push to regulate advanced recycling as manufacturing

Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on the Environment Charles Palmer convened a hearing that focused in part on whether “advanced” or “chemical” recycling should be treated as manufacturing under federal law or regulated as solid waste.

The question matters for permitting and investor certainty. Ross Eisenberg, president of America’s Plastic Makers at the American Chemistry Council, urged the committee to clear regulatory hurdles for advanced recycling and to “regulate advanced recycling properly.” He illustrated the technology this way: “Imagine you could take a cake and you could you could take that cake back down to its elements, the eggs, the flour, the the milk, the sugar, the butter, and then you can make it into a cake again. That is advanced recycling.”

Why it matters: proponents say advanced recycling can process contaminated or hard-to-recycle plastics that mechanical systems cannot, creating feedstock for domestic manufacturing and reducing reliance on virgin resins. Opponents and some committee members warned that the term “chemical recycling” covers many distinct technologies with differing environmental footprints and outcomes, so a single regulatory label may be inappropriate.

Keith Harrison, founder and CEO of The Recycling Partnership, said technologies described as chemical recycling vary widely and must be assessed individually for environmental and human-health impacts, supply-chain viability, and end markets. She cautioned, “Fuel alone is not recycling,” stressing that converting plastic to fuel does not meet common definitions of recycling.

Witnesses and members urged a two-part approach: (1) fill gaps in basic collection, labeling, data and access for proven mechanical recycling systems, and (2) evaluate advanced recycling technologies case-by-case with clear, consistent federal rules that give investors confidence while protecting air, water and public health. Dan Felton, president and CEO of the Flexible Packaging Association, said federal classification would “be meaningful” for certain food-contact and medical applications that need high‑grade recycled feedstocks.

Members from both parties pressed for regulatory clarity. Rep. Dan Crenshaw and others said federal action to define advanced recycling as manufacturing would reduce permitting uncertainty that has chilled investment; witnesses noted 25 states already treat some advanced recycling as manufacturing. At the same time, several members and witnesses warned that any change in definition should not create a way to avoid existing environmental standards or bypass community protections.

The subcommittee made no legislative decision at the hearing. Members cited pending and proposed federal actions — including bills to improve recycling infrastructure and labeling — as possible vehicles for addressing both the classification question and the related funding and data needs.

Looking ahead: lawmakers said they want clearer federal definitions and consistent permitting while ensuring environmental safeguards and transparency for communities near proposed facilities.