New Jersey has issued a one-year conditional approval for PP resin produced via PureCycle’s dissolution recycling process, to count toward the state’s minimum recycled content law for packaging.
In a quarterly earnings call this month, CEO Dustin Olson said the state represented the potential for 25 million to -50 million pounds per /year in demand, comprising up to about half of the full 100 million pound capacity of the flagship Ironton plant in Ohio.
Over the next 12 months, PureCycle will work toward permanent approval by providing documentation of feedstock sources, the type of feedstock processed, end-use applications for PureFive resin, and compliance information.
“This is a landmark moment for PureCycle and for every brand owner working to meet the mandates set by this law,” Olson said in a statement, adding that “significant” customer interest was waiting on regulatory clarity before moving forward. “Generating demand for recycled content is exactly the kind of policy action the world needs if we’re serious about creating circular economies.”
On its site, the state Department of Environmental Protection acknowledged the impact of supply and demand fundamentals including cheap virgin resin on the viability of recycling markets, adding, “Requiring manufacturers to meet minimum recycled content requirements helps to stabilize markets, increase the resiliency of the recycling industry when oil prices fluctuate, and shield municipal recycling programs from the volatility of the cost to recycle.”
PureCycle sourced more than 10.5 million pounds of post-consumer recycled plastic from New Jersey in 2025, more than any other state, the company said. As the Ironton facility continues to ramp up production, the company expects to increase these feedstock volumes.
PureCycle has a secondary sorting facility in Denver, Pennsylvania, roughly 70 miles from the New Jersey border. New Jersey is the 11th most populous state, with nearly 10 million residents, and numerous global brands with significant presence, including pharmaceutical and consumer brands Johnson & Johnson and Merck, as well as foods such as Campbell Soup.
Impact
One of only five states requiring minimum PCR content in plastic packaging, New Jersey implemented a 10% minimum recycled content requirement for rigid plastic containers, beverage containers and other regulated packaging in 2024 that began at 10%. That amount will increase to 20% in 2027, and rise by 10% every three years until reaching 50%.
The law takes a case-by-case approach to evaluating non-mechanical recycling processes including chemical methods (most often pyrolysis) and physical methods such as PureCycle’s dissolution process. Other states with similar laws or potentially including them in emerging EPR laws include California, Washington, Connecticut and Maine.
“This decision not only validates dissolution – a cutting-edge purification process – as an approved plastic-to-plastic recycling solution but identifies a critical supply partner for brands and manufacturers working to comply with the state’s recycled content requirements,” the company said in a statement.
The law included a temporary exemption for food-contact containers, which expires in January 2027. Despite the five-year time frame for the exemption, qualifying recycled content in food-contact applications can take many months, “which has led many brand owners to inquire about PureFive resin over the past year,” PureCycle said in a statement.
PureCycle has received several letters of no objection (LNOs) from the US FDA, typically the first step toward marketing recycled plastics for use in food-contact applications. Most recently, PureCycle announced partnerships with Wisconsin-based Plastic Ingenuity for use of PureFive in takeout coffee lids, and with Toppan on recycled PP films including snack bar wrappers, with an eye toward thermoforming applications.
In addition to the five-year exemption, the state may issue discretionary two-year waivers to address more specific end-use cases. The three grounds for waivers are technological barriers, supply shortages, or conflicts with other regulations that hamper compliance.
Companies including Coca-Cola, Sunny D, Dairy Farmers of America, Del Monte Foods, Molson Coors, PepsiCo and others have received waivers, expiring between April 2026 and January 2028.
