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U.S. Carpet Industry Launches Voluntary Product Stewardship Program

The U.S. carpet industry has launched the Voluntary Product Stewardship (VPS) Program (“Program”) as a voluntary, nationwide effort to divert post-consumer carpet from landfills. A stated objective is also to “… find market-driven solutions to the diversion of Post-Consumer Carpet from landfills as an alternative to EPR (extended producer responsibility)–type legislation or regulations”.

The Carpet America Recovery Effort (CARE) would serve as the Program’s stewardship organisation.  US$4.5 million in funding is being provided through the Carpet and Rug Institute for the first year of the anticipated two-year program.

Consistent with its stated opposition to EPR, the Program is available across the United States, except for where carpet has been collected or sorted in states or local municipalities that have EPR legislation or regulations for post-consumer carpet. With carpet EPR regulation currently in place in California, carpet sourced from or sorted in California would not be eligible to receive funding through the Program.

Details on the program are in the Knowledge Base available to GlobalPSC members. FAQs are available here. A media release for the program is available here.

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