Victory! Governor signs bill banning dumping of plastic pellets in Colorado

DENVER – Colorado Gov. Jared Polis signed the Plastic Pellet-Free Waters Act into law on Monday. The bill, (SB26-016), will ban the dumping of plastic pellets — microplastics that are the building blocks of plastic products –in Colorado and not allow companies to apply for a permit to discharge this plastic pollution in the future. CoPIRG staff gathered over 4,000 signatures from Coloradans supporting this bill.

“Companies shouldn’t be allowed to dump or spill plastic into our waterways,” said Danny Katz, CoPIRG executive director. “Banning the discharge of plastic pellets from facilities or sources that make, use, package or transport them is a commonsense solution to this all-too-common pollution that threatens our waterways and our communities.” 

An estimated 10 trillion pellets escape into the ocean each year. Because these microplastics are so small, it’s easy for them to spill or leak out during production, transportation and use. Every plastic pellet that has ever been spilled or washed into our waters is likely out there in some form or another. That is because pellets can take anywhere from 100 to 1,000 years to break down.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency proposed on Thursday to include microplastics on its official list of contaminants of drinking water. 

The bill is scheduled to go into effect in August 2027.

For more information on plastic pellet pollution, read about CoPIRG’s campaign to protect our waterways.