Maryland's producer plan is due on 1 July 2028, and the date that bars unplanned sales is simply the end of MDE's 120-day review

Step 1: the needs assessment set the baseline the plan must beat

Maryland is unusual in having run its needs assessment before the main law passed. SB 222 of 2023, enacted as Chapter 465 of 2023, was approved by the Governor on 8 May 2023 and took effect on 1 July 2023. It required MDE to approve a single PRO by 1 October 2023 and created the advisory council, and it is the law under which the statewide recycling needs assessment was commissioned (MGA legislation page; needs assessment report, section 1).

The final report was prepared by an HDR team with Eunomia, MSW Consultants, Straughan Environmental, Assedo Consulting and Vision & Planning Consulting. Packaging Dive reported on 6 March 2025 that it came out on 21 February 2025; SPI has not yet confirmed that release date from MDE, whose October 2026 council slides describe it as published in 2025.

Three readings matter for producers. First, the EPR model costs more in total, USD 144 million more by the report’s own figures, but less per ton recycled, because volume rises faster than cost. Second, the baseline is mostly residential: about 65% of the USD 406 million is residential curbside, 32% commercial curbside and 3% drop-off. Third, the report estimated USD 9.2 million to USD 10.3 million of MRF equipment upgrades to add about 190,150 tons a year of capacity, and USD 1.8 million to USD 25.5 million per organics facility.

The report itself flags a tension SPI also sees. Its executive summary describes EPR sector-wide costs as about 20% higher than the baseline, while its USD 406 million and USD 550 million figures imply about 35% by SPI’s calculation. Producers reading it for budget purposes should use the line items, not the summary percentage.

The 2025 law changed what happens next. Section 9-1702.2, added by Chapter 431, makes MDE’s Office of Recycling hire an independent consultant for a statewide recycling needs assessment on or before 30 July 2034 and at least once every ten years after that, paid for by a fee on PROs that the Office must first publish for 90 calendar days of comment. Section 9-2505 ties performance goals and reimbursement to the most recent assessment, which until 2034 is the 2023 law’s one.

Step 2: PRO registration, and why most producers register through CAA

Section 9-2505(A) and COMAR 26.04.14.07 split registration into two flows. The approved PRO files one annual registration form with MDE, beginning 1 July 2026 and each year by 30 June, listing its participating producers and their brands, covered materials by category and weight distributed into Maryland in the previous calendar year, a compliance contact and the annual fee. Producers that are CAA members do not file with MDE; they give CAA the same information by a date in the plan or a method MDE approves (COMAR 26.04.14.07A and B).

The fee is narrow by design. COMAR 26.04.14.07C sets the annual registration fee at an amount sufficient to cover MDE’s costs: record keeping, capped at USD 1,000 a year; developing and updating the statewide list under section 9-2508; regulations under section 9-2511; and, from 2028, registering service providers. The first fee, due 1 July 2026, covered estimated costs from 1 June 2025 to 30 June 2026 plus MDE’s estimated fiscal year costs. A PRO may not charge its members more in registration fees, in total, than it pays MDE. The regulation also states: “Fees may not be prorated due to termination, acquisition, or merger.” SPI has not yet confirmed the amount CAA paid for 2026.

Categories are the operational burden. COMAR 26.04.14.04 lists the categories in which covered materials are reported, to be used in sequential order, with small-format items in their own categories where one exists. SPI counts 61: 15 paper, 27 plastic (one small-format, 23 rigid by resin code and use, three flexible), 10 metal, three glass, four certified compostable and two wood and other organics. Thirteen catch-all categories must be identified on the registration form. Records go back five years, must be produced within 15 business days or a later timeline MDE sets, and prorated national data may be used with MDE’s approval where state data is not available (COMAR 26.04.14.09).

Who the producer is: the COMAR order applied brand by brand

The plan rests on knowing which entity is the producer for each item. COMAR 26.04.14.02B(25), as set out in MDE’s compliance guide, gives an order for packaging sold at physical retail in Maryland, and the first party that applies is the producer (Exhibit 5).

Two scope rules sit around the order. A de minimis producer, one that introduced less than 1 ton of covered material into Maryland or earned less than USD 2,000,000 in global gross revenue in its most recent fiscal year, is outside the producer definition (section 9-2501). And some materials are exempt, among them packaging for infant formula, medical food and certain FDA-regulated products. MDE’s guide adds that neither exempt nor excluded materials count as covered materials under the law.

MDE’s response to comments shows where it held the line. It declined a size-based de minimis exemption for small items, saying small materials often become contamination; it kept labels, including shipping labels, within packaging; and it kept paper products for industrial, commercial and institutional use within scope, on the reading that the statute limits only packaging to personal, noncommercial use.

Step 3: the advisory council, and what it has to say before a plan is filed

Section 9-2503 creates the Producer Responsibility Advisory Council, with members appointed by the Secretary of the Environment. The 2025 law removed the earlier cap of up to 21 members, made the PRO’s representative and the Director of the Land and Materials Administration nonvoting, barred PRO members from voting seats and cochair roles, and gave the council the duty to advise on plan drafting, review plans and annual reports and recommend approval. Crucially, before a plan is submitted the producer or PRO must consult the council and respond in writing to its written recommendations (section 9-2505(B)).

COMAR 26.04.14.12 fills in the detail (Exhibit 6). The council has 15 to 25 members, and changing its size needs the Secretary’s approval and 30 days of public notice. Members serve four years, can be reappointed for two more, and may not serve more than six years continuously. A formal recommendation needs a majority of the voting members present, and a quorum is a majority of voting members. Members must attend at least 66% of regular meetings a year, and alternates may stand in for no more than 33%.

The council has been busy. MDE’s archive lists eight meetings in 2024, under the earlier name Packaging Advisory Council, 14 in 2025 and nine in 2026 to date, the latest being meeting 31 in October 2026 (Exhibit 7). Topics in 2026 included the curbside covered materials list, on which AMERIPEN filed responses in February, reuse and refill, on which Upstream filed recommendations in March, and CAA’s producer registration updates in May and September.

Meeting 31’s agenda shows the council turning to the plan itself. Its slides list the plan content MDE expects: performance goals for recycling, composting, reuse and return rates, the share of waste reduced, postconsumer recycled content and greenhouse gas reduction; how goals will be met; financing through producer fees; infrastructure investment with an open selection process; reimbursement rates; and public outreach. They also show the Pressurized Cylinder Industry Association’s exemption request, received on 15 July 2026, under consideration as part of “Round 2 Regulations”.

A framework: five gates between registration and an approved plan

SPI turns the four statutory steps into five gates a producer passes through (Exhibit 8). The steps describe what the state does; the gates describe what a producer must have in hand to reach the next one. Each gate is drawn from a COMAR regulation or a statutory section.

The gates are not equal in weight. Gates 1 and 2 are compliance tasks with known answers. Gate 3 is where cost is decided: CAA’s 28 May 2026 slides list seven performance goal categories under SB 901 (recycling, composting, reuse, return, source reduction, postconsumer recycled content and greenhouse gas reduction) and set 2027 as the year to set targets through consultation, develop plan components and check data. Gate 5 is binary: a covered material either sits under an approved plan on 29 October 2028 or it cannot be sold.

The 25% duty is the sharpest item in gate 3. Section 9-2505(C)(4) requires each participating producer to reduce packaging material waste by at least 25% within five years after the first plan is approved. SPI has not yet confirmed how MDE or CAA will measure that reduction, by weight, by unit or by another method, and the October 2026 council slides list the percent to be waste reduced as a plan content item still to be settled.

Step 4: the plan clock, and why 29 October 2028 is not arbitrary

The statute sets the plan due on or before 1 July 2028 and every five years after, individually or through a PRO (section 9-2505(B)). MDE then has 120 days to approve, approve with conditions or reject it; within 60 days of initial approval the submitter pays MDE’s review costs and estimated costs through the first annual report; implementation must start no later than six months after approval; and plans expire after five years unless renewed (section 9-2505(H) to (J)). COMAR 26.04.14.10C applies the same 1 July 2028 date, or a later date MDE sets, to producers filing their own plan.

The arithmetic explains the date. By SPI’s calculation, 1 July 2028 plus 120 days is 29 October 2028, the same day COMAR 26.04.14.10B uses for the sales bar. MDE’s guide and the regulation both keep the words “or a later date the Department sets”, which gives MDE room if review runs long. SPI has not yet confirmed whether MDE would use that room for a plan approved with conditions.

The timing also leaves one question that the sources answer differently. The statute sets reimbursement of at least 50% of cost per ton by 1 July 2028, the day the plan is filed and before it can be approved. CAA’s May 2026 slides show 50% reimbursement for service providers in 2029 based on 2028 baseline data, and CAA’s Maryland page says fee collection will likely begin before 1 July 2028 but start dates have not been set. SPI has not yet confirmed how the 2028 reimbursement will be calculated or paid.

Scenarios: what the reimbursement floors could mean in dollars

No Maryland fee schedule exists, and CAA has not set one. What can be calculated is the scale of producer funding the statutory floors imply against the cost base in the needs assessment (Exhibit 10). This is not a fee forecast.

The assumptions are stated so they can be checked. The low case applies the 50% floor to the USD 406 million baseline. The base case applies the 90% floor to the same baseline, the cost of the system as it was in 2022. The high case applies 90% to the USD 550 million modelled EPR system. Per-ton figures divide by the 2.9 million tons of covered material generated in 2022, and the 100-ton brand multiplies that by 100. At the 75% floor the same two cost bases give USD 304.5 million and USD 412.5 million.

Three things could push real figures down. Material value, about USD 149 million in the baseline and USD 202 million in the EPR model, is captured somewhere in the system; the statute reimburses cost per ton, and SPI has not yet confirmed whether the plan will net material value off. The baseline includes commercial curbside service, about 32% of cost, which SPI has not confirmed is reimbursable. And per-ton fees will be set by material, so a brand’s actual bill depends on its mix, as Oregon and Colorado’s schedules show in Ledger 04.

Enforcement: what happens if a producer misses a gate

Penalties are modest per violation but compound by the day. COMAR 26.04.14.11 sets USD 5,000 for a first violation, USD 10,000 for a second and a USD 20,000 civil penalty for a third or later one, imposed only after a written notice and a 60-day correction period, with each further day a separate violation (Exhibit 11). The statute adds up to USD 250,000 for a PRO that misses plan performance goals. Penalties go to the State Recycling Trust Fund.

The larger risk after October 2028 is the sales bar, not the fine. A material outside an approved plan cannot be sold, offered, distributed or imported for use in Maryland, which for a national brand means a supply chain decision, not a compliance cost. Financial records may be audited by an independent auditor MDE designates, paid for by the PRO or IPP producer from at least three bids (COMAR 26.04.14.09E).