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132nd MAINE LEGISLATURE
SECOND REGULAR SESSION-2026
Legislative Document No. 2036
H.P. 1366 House of Representatives, December 5, 2025
An Act to Clarify the Approval Process for and the Operation of the
Commingling Program for the Management of Beverage Containers
Approved for introduction by a majority of the Legislative Council pursuant to Joint Rule
203.
Received by the Clerk of the House on December 3, 2025. Referred to the Committee on
Environment and Natural Resources pursuant to Joint Rule 308.2 and ordered printed pursuant
to Joint Rule 401.
ROBERT B. HUNT
Clerk
Presented by Representative CAMPBELL of Orrington.
Page 1 - 132LR2845(01)
1Be it enacted by the People of the State of Maine as follows:
2Sec. 1. 38 MRSA §3107, sub-§3-B, ¶B, as amended by PL 2025, c. 241, §§7 and
3 8, is further amended by amending subparagraph (1) to read:
4 (1) The method by which the program will facilitate and, no later than October 1,
5 2026, complete the transition from beverage container sorting at redemption
6 centers by brand to sorting by material type and, for redemption centers that
7 manually sort containers, by size and deposit value within each material type. The
8 program must be designed to complete this transition no later than October 1, 2026,
9 as long as at least 90% of the initiators of deposit included in the program have
10 provided auditable beverage container sales data to the commingling cooperative
11 by June 30, 2026. The program may facilitate the negotiation of agreements with
12 redemption centers to gather brand data through use of reverse vending machines,
13 account-based bulk processing programs or similar technology as long as the cost
14 of such data collection is paid by the program;
15Sec. 2. 38 MRSA §3107, sub-§3-B, ¶C, as amended by PL 2025, c. 241, §9 and
16 affected by §21, is further amended to read:
17 C. Within 120 days of receipt of a plan submitted by the cooperative under paragraph
18 B, the department shall review the plan and approve the plan, approve the plan with
19 conditions or reject the plan. Prior to determining whether to approve or reject a plan,
20 the department shall hold a public meeting on the plan. The department shall notify
21 the cooperative in writing of its determination and, if the plan is approved with
22 conditions or rejected, shall include in the notification a description of the basis for the
23 conditions or rejection. Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, the
24 department's review of and determination of whether to approve or reject a plan
25 submitted by the cooperative under paragraph B is not a license or permit decision or
26 other final action of the department and is not subject to the rules adopted by the
27 department regarding the processing of applications.
28 (1) If the cooperative's plan is rejected, it may submit a revised plan to the
29 department within 60 days of receiving the notice of rejection. The department
30 may approve the revised plan as submitted or approve the revised plan subject to
31 the implementation of specific changes required by the department.
32 (2) If the cooperative's plan is approved in accordance with this paragraph, the
33 cooperative shall implement the plan on or before January 15, 2026 in accordance
34 with the timeline for implementation described in paragraph B, subparagraph (13),
35 subject to any changes or conditions imposed by the department. If the cooperative
36 fails to implement an approved plan on or before January 15, 2026, the initiators
37 of deposit that are members of each of the commingling groups included in the
38 cooperative are deemed to be in violation of this chapter and are subject to penalties
39 pursuant to section 3111.
40Sec. 3. Retroactivity. This Act applies retroactively to January 1, 2025.
41SUMMARY
42 This bill amends the laws governing the beverage container redemption program to
43 provide that the operation plan for the management of beverage containers under a single
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44 commingling program submitted to the Department of Environmental Protection by the
45 commingling cooperative must be designed to complete the transition from beverage
46 container sorting by brand to sorting by material type no later than October 1, 2026, as long
47 as at least 90% of the initiators of deposit included in the program have provided auditable
48 beverage container sales data to the commingling cooperative by June 30, 2026. It also
49 provides that the department's review of and determination of whether to approve or reject
50 an operation plan submitted by the commingling cooperative is not a license or permit
51 decision or other final action of the department and is not subject to the rules adopted by
52 the department regarding processing of applications. These changes to the laws governing
53 the beverage container redemption program are made retroactive to January 1, 2025.
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