8th State of Recycling report finds Colorado’s total waste down slightly

DENVER – The day before America Recycles Day, Eco-Cycle and CoPIRG Foundation released their 8th annual State of Recycling and Composting in Colorado report, which found the total municipal waste generated dropped from 7,077,958 tons in 2018 to 6,870,398 in 2023. The small decrease comes despite an overall increase in the population and with many transformational changes to our waste system yet to kick in. 

While overall waste is down, Colorado’s recycling and composting rate remains stubbornly low at 15.5%. That rate will jump when Colorado’s Producer Responsibility system rolls out convenient curbside recycling to all Coloradans in 2026.   

“Years of hard work by state and local leaders to cut harmful single-use plastics and transform our recycling system is just beginning to pay off,” said Danny Katz, CoPIRG executive director and co-author of the report. “2025 is a great year to take the next big steps by expanding programs that effectively divert organic materials and batteries out of landfills, and expand reuse programs that reduce the amount of stuff we need in the first place.” 

“Cutting waste while our population grows is a big win,” said Randy Moorman, director of policy and campaigns at Eco-Cycle, one of the two organizations co-authoring the report. “Our recycling and composting rates are still too low, but Colorado is on the brink of major change with groundbreaking measures that will boost recycling and establish a foundation for circularity, especially for packaging. Now, we need to tackle the nearly 40% of our landfill waste that’s food scraps and yard trimmings by investing in composting infrastructure and policies.”

According to the report, the cities of Boulder, Loveland and Fort Collins lead the way on recycling rates on the Front Range. Aspen and Durango have the best rates in Greater Colorado. Leading cities have a few things in common including:

• Universal curbside recycling programs in which every resident is provided with a recycling cart; 
• Volume-based pricing for trash that encourages recycling and composting;
• Convenient drop-off centers and access to curbside collections for food scraps and/or yard trimmings; and
• Strong education programs that provide clear guidelines on what can and cannot be recycled, reused, and composted.

In communities diverting 25% or more of their materials from landfills, residents and businesses have some access to organics diversion, most commonly through yard trimming drop-off sites. Some also provide curbside organics collections via municipal contracts with a hauler or a partnership with a Colorado composting business. The City of Aspen is leading the way as the first in the state to require diversion of organics from the landfill starting with food retail businesses. Since this ordinance took effect in October of 2023, Aspen has seen a 70% increase in food scrap diversion.     

At the report release, the City and County of Denver was highlighted for their work in expanding curbside composting to more residents, which will roll out to all solid waste customers in 2025. As of the report writing, Denver had added 20,000 additional compost customers resulting in a 9% increase in compost tonnage collected from 2022 to 2023 with an additional 7% increase as of the report writing in 2024.

Looking ahead to 2025, advocates are urging state and local leaders to focus on three key areas:

• Organic Diversion – Diverting organic matter such as food scraps and yard trimmings from landfills avoids methane emissions and creates valuable soil amendments  such as compost, biochar, and mulch, which help restore Colorado’s depleted soils. To boost organics diversion from the current 10% to 60% by 2036 we will need more collections and processing infrastructure, along with  policies mandating the diversion of organic material from landfills through donation of useable food and composting of non-edible organic material, similar to the City of Aspen’s 2023 ordinance.
   
• Batteries – Batteries contain valuable materials, some of which can be recycled into new products, but when improper disposal especially of lithium-ion batteries—pose a serious fire hazard. Battery-caused fires in collection trucks, material recovery facilities, and waste facilities are increasingly becoming more frequent, endangering employees, damaging infrastructure, and significantly increasing operational and insurance costs. Adopting a producer responsibility program for batteries could provide the funding and a mechanism needed to reduce battery waste and ensure these critical materials are recovered and repurposed.
   
• Reuse – Reuse offers significant environmental benefits by reducing the need for new products while saving money for consumers and businesses. The potential for reuse is vast, spanning sectors such as reuse/refill businesses (bulk food, serviceware, etc.), resale markets (thrift/consignment, used books, gear and cars, auction, pawn, etc.), rental services (cars, bridal, equipment, etc.), and repair services (tailoring/mending, shoe repair, electronic repair, auto repair, etc.).

The report can be found here.