Washington Opens Public Comment on Its Draft Recycling Lists; Closes August 19

Washington’s Department of Ecology opened public comment on the preliminary statewide collection lists on August 5, 2026. Comments closed at 11:59 p.m. Pacific on August 19, 2026, through Ecology’s online comment form. The draft lists were posted as a spreadsheet dated August 3 and cover 96 material categories. What this means for you: these lists decide which materials Washington will require to be collected statewide, and that list is the yardstick your packaging gets measured against once the program starts charging. This window has closed and nothing is being accepted on it. Ecology has published no comment summary and no revised list as of September 7, 2026. The statutory deadline that matters next is October 1, 2026, by which Ecology must publish the statewide collection lists under RCW 70A.208.090. A separate comment period, on the text of chapter 173-950 WAC rather than on the lists, is still open and closes September 2, 2026. Source: Washington Department of Ecology (August 2026).