COMMERCE CITY, Colo. — While Colorado still has a lot of work to do to divert waste away from landfills, the state is making progress when it comes to composting and recycling.
That's according to the 2025 State of Recycling and Composting in Colorado report, which was released Thursday by Eco-Cycle and the Colorado Public Interest Research Group, or CoPIRG, for short.
While the statewide waste diversion rate is still around half of the national average, the authors report progress has been made in Colorado over the last nine years they've been tracking data.
"We've started to see more of a combined vision towards circularity, and we're seeing a lot more actions to get us to that more circular economy,' said Rachel Setzke, senior policy advisor for Eco-Cycle.
The study, which the Scripps News Group read through, highlighted unique solutions — such as one currently being done by Commerce City-based Perk's Deconstruction.
"We unbuild houses," said Perk's Deconstruction owner, Anna Perk. "By taking structures apart piece by piece, we divert at least 75% of the building from the landfill."
In 2024, the company recovered 261,857 pounds of reusable construction materials and recycled 838,140, according to the study.
In Aspen, the city saw a 223% increase in food scraps from restaurants being composted, totaling nearly 2,600 tons in 2024.
Statewide, other organic material like tree limbs and leaves were diverted from landfills 50% more than the year before.
The report authors said local and statewide policies and programs are pushing the change, but many communities don't have easy access to the same sort of resources to be part of the solution.
A law set to go into effect in January, HB22-1355, could make recycling more accessible.
It requires companies that sell products in paper packaging to create an independent nonprofit organization to fund and manage the new recycling system. In May of 2023, Circular Action Alliance was chosen as that organization.
"We were the third nation to adopt a Producer Responsibility Law for packaging and paper back in 2022. It seems like a long time, but because we're at the front edge of this, it's taken that long to responsibly put together the plan for how to roll that out," said Setzke.
Organizations and stakeholders are still ironing out the rules that are expected to be voted on in mid-December.
"Starting next year, Circular Action Alliance, will start reimbursing service providers and municipalities for recycling, which means Coloradans are going to start seeing free access to recycling in 2026. [For] some communities, it's going to take a couple more years," she said.
Read the full report by clicking here.
