The goal of SB 21/22 is to improve and restore overall clean water protections. The legislature amended The Water Quality Act to establish a permitting and water quality standards system for groundwater discharge. The New Mexico Environment Department (NMED) must establish a Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (PDES) to regulate the discharge of pollutants into the state’s waters.

Why Does SB 21/22 Matter to New Mexico?

SB 21/22 fills a massive regulatory shortcoming and will protect New Mexico’s primary water resources, safe drinking water, community health, and the long-term viability of agriculture and recreation. SB 21/22 is New Mexico’s response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Sackett v. EPA decision in 2023, which resulted in the loss of federal protections for nearly all of the state’s streams, rivers, and wetlands—with New Mexico not having an all-inclusive groundwater discharge permitting system left the unprotected waters vulnerable, named the most engaged in the United States by American Rivers in 2024. The new state-level permit system for pollutant discharges into the surface water creates the authority for New Mexico to enforce the federal Clean Water Act, regardless of federal protection status. Additionally, the state will focus on polluted groundwater, directly place cleanup accountability on polluters, and establish a dedicated funding source.

The anticipated benefits of SB 21

• Improved water quality of surface and groundwater protections from pollution, which protects drinking water, agriculture, recreation, and wildlife.
• Reduced risks associated with contaminated water to protect the future of New Mexico’s public health.
• Economic benefits for locations with clean water are more attractive for business growth and development and support industries that rely on clean water, such as outdoor recreation and agriculture.
• Local controls give authority to New Mexico to oversee the protection of its water resources, not having to rely on federal regulations.
• Protection for vulnerable communities that face higher risks of the impacts of water pollution.
• Polluters will be held accountable as the responsible party for cleaning up contamination through updated enforcement policies.

How will this be funded?

SB 21/22 outlines a dedicated funding source to support the cleanup of New Mexico’s contaminated sites through responding, investigating, and remediating, and all polluters bear the burden of costs to clean up their pollution, not state tax dollars. Initially, SB 21/22 planned to appropriate a $50 million fund for groundwater cleanup efforts and surface water quality fees and penalties directed to a water quality management fund for administering the new permit rules similar to the final bill. The final bill also establishes penalties for violations of the PDES Act, including fines and imprisonment.

With the implementation of SB 21/22, similar to the federal Clean Water Act, there are exemptions. An exemption may include traditional farming and ranching activities and associated acequia operations to remove unneeded regulatory burdens on essential agricultural practices, only existing surface waters in farm production, and if the discharge is nontoxic.

What’s next? 

New Mexico will move forward to establish a comprehensive state permitting program. It may look to get authorization from the U.S. EPA for surface water permitting, which would be one of the few remaining states to do this. Overall, New Mexicans will have greater control over the quality of surface waters. Developing and implementing a permit will not happen overnight, and it will likely take a few years to be fully effective; this is a critical first step and a long-term commitment to secure the future of essential water resources.

Source: SB 21/22 – WATER QUALITY & POLLUTION

Written by: Andrew Kalemba, Operations Specialist at the Southwest EFC 

Featured Image by Brigitte Werner from Pixabay

Senate Bill 37’s (SB 37) purpose is to keep water in New Mexico’s waterways because many of the state’s waterways no longer qualify or meet the criteria for federal protection, such as many streams that do not flow year-round and many wetlands that do not have the required continuous surface connection to streams.

SB 37 will enhance the effectiveness of New Mexico’s water reserve by keeping water in New Mexico’s waterways. The reserve will be filled through new water projects, and existing water rights will be purchased. Water stored in the reserve will be accessed during the state’s most critical drought or other water shortages.

How does SB 37 address the Water Reserve Gap?

1) SB 37 creates a non-reverting fund for the Strategic Water Reserve. Allocated funds will never expire. For example, no matter how long it may take to complete a water rights transaction, such as a purchase or lease, the allocated funds will be available to support the transaction. Before SB 37, allocated funds could expire and be repurposed to the general fund before the execution of a transaction, which resulted in many missed opportunities for the state. Furthermore, the revised fund creates additional opportunities with readily available funds to assure water rights holders that they will be compensated for selling or leasing water to the state.

2) SB 37 includes aquifer recharge as a third primary way for the State of New Mexico to acquire water, acknowledging the relationship between surface water and groundwater. Utilizing the reserve for aquifer recharge, New Mexico can work towards developing and maintaining restorative stream flows and replenishing groundwater supplies simultaneously. The reserve will also support flexible, adaptive groundwater management and address groundwater depletion through continuous learning and adjustment.

3) SB 37 gives authority to the Interstate Stream Commission (ISC) to prioritize certain water transactions with supplementary benefits, considering the bigger picture impacts of water management. At least one of the following criteria is required to prioritize a transaction: interstate compact compliance, benefit to threatened or endangered species, and aquifer recharge. An example of a supplementary benefit could be recreation and cultural significance.

In Conclusion

New Mexico is taking significant strides in shaping the state’s water future during the 2025 legislative session, aiming to minimize future risks. SB 37 has the potential to stimulate the economy’s growth with new water projects. Still, on the other hand, we should consider the potential financial costs of maintaining reserves and ensure that they do not become cost-prohibitive. The improvements that SB 37, SB 21/22, and HB 137 lay out as part of New Mexico’s 50-year Water Action Plan are critical to giving the state the control it requires over its water resources and allowing it to reach its full water management potential. SB 37

Source: SB 37 – STRATEGIC WATER RESERVE FUND

Written by: Andrew Kalemba, Operations Specialist at the Southwest EFC 

Featured Image by John Foxx from FreeImages

Humans have been recycling in one form or another for hundreds (if not thousands) of years.  For most of history, new materials have been expensive and difficult to obtain, so people used and reused whatever they had.  This has been particularly true in times of war or economic shortages. Mass scale recycling was born sometime in the early 1970s.  The first recycling “programs” required consumers to separate recyclable materials into different bins, such as glass, paper, metal and plastic They also required recyclable material to be clean, and often consumers had to transport the bins to recycling centers. This recycling model was fairly effective, with most of the material actually being recycled, but did not gain wide acceptance.

In the early 1980s, the first curbside recycling programs began to appear, and the country eventually moved to a “single stream” or mixed recycling model, in which all recyclable materials are put into one bin.  Along with this change, some municipalities began to mandate recycling. This greatly increased the number of households willing to recycle, but it also created another problem, namely that the material still had to be sorted before it could actually be recycled. The recycling industry has struggled to develop machinery to accomplish the sorting, but the problem persists, and other problems have arisen.  As Americans enthusiastically signed on to the notion of recycling, they have begun to cram their recycling bins with all sorts of material that is not recyclable. This is known as “aspirational recycling”, but whether it is the result of extreme optimism or just laziness is hard to say. But there is a lot of confusion about what is recyclable and what is not. One of the problems comes from the use of that little circular arrow symbol that every manufacturer now stamps on plastic containers. The symbol was originally designed by a University of Southern California student in 1970 for a contest tied to the first Earth Day celebration.  The numbers printed inside the symbol (from 1 to 7) refer to the type of plastic used in the container.  Here’s what they mean.

1. Polyethylene Terephthalate (PETE/PET): The most widely used recyclable plastic.
2. High Density Polyethylene (HDPE): The second most widely used plastic and easiest to break down in recycling.
3. Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC): Not really recyclable.
4. Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE): Accepted by some (but not all) curbside recycling programs.
5. Polypropylene (PP): Often used in food containers that can be reused. Becoming more commonly accepted in curbside recycling programs.
6. Polystyrene (PS): Known as Styrofoam: Very difficult to recycle. Has been shown to leach dangerous toxins over time. The worst of all the plastics.
7. Everything Else: A catch-all for all sorts of plastic material, some of which is not even known to the manufacturer. Not usually acceptable in recycling programs.

The use of this symbol has never been regulated, and different manufacturers may use it in different ways. Just because it has that little recycling symbol on it does not mean it will (or even can) get recycled.

A great deal of the plastic we use is not really eligible for recycling. The reasons for this are multiple. For some plastics (called thermoset plastic) there really isn’t a process to recycle it.  For others, it simply isn’t economically feasible, meaning that the cost of recycling is greater than the cost of producing new plastic. Many plastics are used in tandem with other types of plastic or other materials, and it is not possible to separate them.  Other plastics are too dirty to recycle.  Some examples of items that seem to most of us to be recyclable, but which are not recyclable are:

• Coffee cups. That’s right, that highly touted “recyclable” paper coffee cup cannot be recycled. Why?  Because the inside is coated with a thin layer of plastic. This layer of plastic keeps the coffee from soaking through the paper and helps keep the coffee hot. But it also cannot easily be separated from the paper and that makes it not recyclable. The same goes for cartons used for milk, broth and juice.
• Any plastic marked with a “3” (Polyvinyl Chloride or PVC)
• Any plastic marked with a “6” (Polystyrene or PS)
• Any plastic marked with a “7”
• Plastic bags
• Plastic straws
• Any type of plastic that is dirty—i.e. has food residue in it
• Small plastic items like lids. Even though they may be used on recyclable bottles, they are usually of an unknown type of plastic. In addition, they are too small to be effectively sorted and recycled.
• “Compostable” bags and containers. Recycling and composting are two entirely different processes which require different facilities.  When these items are included with recycling, they have to be picked out and sent to the landfill. Unless your community has a composting program that can handle these items (with a separate bin for collecting them), you should put them in your regular trash.  They will not break down in home composting systems, and when enclosed in a landfill, they break down much like plastic—into smaller and smaller pieces that do not fully degrade back into the soil.

For the most part, only clear plastic (such as water bottles) labeled with “1” (Polyethylene Terephthalate or PETE) or “2” (High Density Polyethylene or HDPE) is actually recycled. Colored plastic, although potentially recyclable, poses another problem. For colored plastic to be recycled effectively it really needs to be sorted by color.  But every manufacturer of bottles and containers (from milk to shampoo) has a different array of colors. Sorting by colors is practically impossible.  If all the colors are mixed together, you end up with a dull brown or grey—a color that is not marketable. Some manufacturers have “solved” this problem by putting a tight colored sleeve on a clear container instead of coloring the plastic. But that creates a different problem—that of getting the sleeve off before the recycling process can begin. And, of course, the sleeve is often a type of plastic that is not recyclable!

Even if the plastic can be recycled, it can only be recycled once or twice. That plastic water bottle is not simply melted down and made into another plastic water bottle. Most plastic that is recycled is actually “downcycled”.  It is made into something of lower quality and lesser value, such as carpet or a cotton-poly fabric or fleece. These items are not recyclable, and they are STILL Plastic, which will end up somewhere in the environment. Furthermore, the recycling of plastic always involves the addition of new “virgin” plastic to increase its quality.  That means more plastic. By contrast, both metal and glass are recyclable almost indefinitely.

Another issue to be considered here is what portion of the potentially recyclable material is actually recycled? Let’s consider what happens to your yogurt cup after you put it in the recycle bin.  It gets picked up by the recycling division of your municipal solid waste management department.  It then gets unloaded to a conveyor belt at the local recycling center and is typically sorted either by machines or by humans, sometimes a combination.  In this process, non-recyclables, small items, and dirty items are removed and sent to the landfill.  The rest is bundled into large bales and sold to a wholesaler who then sells it on. The yogurt container in my fridge right now is labeled with a “5.” That means it is polypropylene, which is a type of plastic that could potentially get recycled. However, if it is dirty it will probably be sent to the landfill. If it is enclosed in a trash bag or broken into small pieces, it will end up in the landfill.  So, a lot of plastic that could be recycled is not being recycled because of problems with the process.  This includes recyclable plastic that is thrown into trash bins instead of recycling bins. No one knows how much this might be.

For decades most recycling in this country ended up being loaded onto ships and sent to China where it would get sorted, and some of it would be recycled into cheap plastic goods—bags, shoes, toys, and endless other plastic items that would then be exported around the world. There were several problems with this system. First, most municipalities could barely break even between what was paid for the recycling and the cost to collect, sort and bundle it.  Second, the carbon footprint of all that transportation just adds to the climate problem. Third, plants in China were stuck with tons of unrecyclable and unusable material, and a lot of it got dumped into landfills, rivers and the ocean.  Then, in 2017, China announced it would no longer accept plastic for recycling starting in January 2018.  Since then, recycling has been piling up as municipalities struggle to figure out what to do with it. Some has been diverted to other countries, most of whom are not really equipped to deal with it. In fact, Malaysia has recently started shipping back large containers of recycling material that has been illegally shipped there.  But the problem remains. With no market for it, many municipalities and solid waste management companies are choosing to just put it in the landfill, where it leaches toxic chemicals into the soil and then into the water supply. Burying plastic in landfills just hides the problem. And it lasts virtually FOREVER.

What’s to be done?  We will consider some alternatives to single-use plastic (some good, some not so good) in part 3 of “What Should I Do with My Yogurt Cup?”

References

https://blog.nationalgeographic.org/2018/04/04/7-things-you-didnt-know-about-plastic-and-recycling/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/lauratenenbaum/2019/05/15/these-three-plastic-recycling-myths-will-blow-your-mind/#39ee378475f0
https://www.ptonline.com/blog/post/colored-pet-pretty-to-look-at-headache-for-recyclers-https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2018/11/are-bioplastics-made-from-plants-better-for-environment-ocean-plastic/
https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/50207/what-do-those-recycling-symbols-and-codes-mean
http://www.all-recycling-facts.com/recycling-symbols.html
https://www.eater.com/2020/1/15/21065446/compostable-take-out-containers
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/aug/17/plastic-recycling-myth-what-really-happens-your-rubbish
https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/28/asia/malaysia-plastic-waste-return-intl/index.html
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/03/09/591568093/in-the-recycling-world-why-are-some-cartons-such-a-problem
https://komonews.com/news/nation-world/malaysia-to-send-back-plastic-waste-to-foreign-nations
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2019/09/20/how-to-recycle-plastic
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/venessawong/plastic-drinking-problem
https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/venessawong/coca-cola-is-grappling-with-our-karmic-anxiety-over-all

Written by: Sandi Blanton

Photo by Peggy Gilbert

In the middle of the Pacific Ocean, between San Francisco and Hawaii, is an area roughly 4 times the size of California that contains approximately 1.8 trillion pieces of trash weighing 80,000 metric tons. This area is known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (GPGP). It covers 618,000 square miles and is growing.  The trash collects in the area because of a meteorological phenomenon called the North Pacific Gyre, which is a system of circulating currents in the ocean. From time to time, the ocean currents can cause the area to spit out some of the debris, much of which accumulates on the beaches in the Hawaiian Islands.

Most of what accumulates in the GPGP is plastic. The reason for this is twofold. The first is the overwhelming use of plastics for almost everything. The second is that plastic does not biodegrade. If I drop a piece of wood or a paperback book into the ocean, it will float for a while, then sink to the bottom and rot. If I drop a metal cup, the same thing will happen, but it will take a bit longer. But if I drop a plastic water bottle, it will be there, in some form, for centuries, maybe even millennia. But, here’s the really big problem. Exposure to the sun’s UV rays and the sea environment cause the plastic to break up into smaller and smaller pieces.  These tiny pieces make up the majority of the GPGP, creating a toxic “plastic soup.”  What’s worse is that marine wildlife mistake these small particles for food and eat them.  Experts say that 90% of all seabirds have plastic in their bodies, and that plastic will outweigh fish in the ocean by 2050.  In addition, studies have found that plastics attract and accumulate persistent organic pollutants (POPs) such as carcinogenic and endocrine-disrupting polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), and organochlorine pesticides such as DDD, a derivative of DDT. These POPs, when consumed by fish and other marine animals, endanger both the animals that ingest them and others higher up the food chain, including humans and especially human babies.

So, where does all that trash come from?  The really short answer is “us.” From water bottles dropped on the beach, plastic beach toys swept out with the tide, various small “disposable” items that get washed into storm sewers, fishing nets lost at sea, stuff swept off decks of ships or intentionally dumped. It goes on and on.  It is estimated that 80% percent comes from land-based activities in North America and Asia. The remaining 20 percent comes from boaters, offshore oil rigs, and large cargo ships that dump or lose debris directly into the water.  The GPGP is the largest dump in the world. But it’s not the only one. Numerous other ocean gyres where garbage is concentrated have been identified around the globe. And it’s not all concentrated.  It has been estimated that every square mile of ocean contains 46,000 pieces of floating plastic, and in some areas, the amount of plastic outweighs the amount of plankton by six times. Of the more than 300 million tons of plastic produced each year, about 10 percent ends up in the ocean. That’s 30 million tons.

50% of the 300 million tons of plastic produced in the world every year is what is known as “single use plastic,” used for only a short time, but lasting in the environment for hundreds (maybe thousands) of years. Immediately we think of plastic water bottles. But that’s not all–  sandwich bags, cling film, milk jugs, yogurt containers, cottage cheese containers, candy wrappers, cookie packages, drinking straws, chip bags, bread bags, produce bags; the plastic bags we take home from grocery stores, department stores, restaurants and hardware stores; laundry detergent bottles, fabric softener, bleach, household cleaners, dishwashing liquid, bottles with oil, vinegar, mayonnaise, mustard, catsup, juice, peanut butter, maple syrup. The co-op grocery in my neighborhood where I shop has a large bulk section, and I generally have felt pretty smug about buying a lot of staples and spices in bulk. But guess what? I bring everything home in a plastic bag, empty that bag into the jars in my pantry and throw the bag away!  (I have, by the way, stopped doing that.)

But the list goes on—every bottle of shampoo, conditioner, shower gel, hand soap and hand lotion, every tube of toothpaste, every tube of deodorant, every bottle of vitamins, nutrition supplements, all those annoying-to-open prescription pill bottles. It’s endless. Even a lot of our clothes are made of plastic, which is what polyester is.  And, of course, there is the slight problem that all plastic is made from oil, which is not endless, and causes all sorts of other problems.

Hold on, you say. Isn’t a lot of that recyclable? Some is and some isn’t.  But there’s a big gap between being recyclable and being recycled.  Mass production of plastic began in the 1950s, only 6 decades ago. In that 60 years, the world has produced 8.3 billion metric tons of plastic (that’s 18.3 trillion pounds!). Of that, only 9% has been recycled.  Most of it—79 percent—is accumulating in landfills or making its way into the natural environment as litter.  Much of it will end up in the oceans. And it’s not as if we are slowing down.  So far, plastic manufacturing has doubled every 15 years. And half of all the plastic manufactured becomes trash in less than a year, in spite of nearly ubiquitous recycling programs!  Why?   We’ll take a look at recycling in part 2 of “What Should I Do with My Yogurt Cup?”

References

https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/great-pacific-garbage-patch/
https://blogs.ei.columbia.edu/2011/01/26/our-oceans-a-plastic-soup/
https://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/earth/oceanography/great-pacific-garbage-patch.htm
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2017/07/plastic-produced-recycling-waste-ocean-trash-debris-environment/
https://www.amusingplanet.com/2016/05/kamilo-hawaiis-plastic-beach.html

Written by: Sandi Blanton

Photo by Algalita Marine Research Foundation from flikr