Solid waste: compostable materials.

Senator McNerney, with Senator Hurtado and Assembly colleagues as coauthors, advances SB 279 to create a new statutory framework that expands the scope of composting activities eligible for exclusion from full permitting and adds a distinct excluded-category for biomass-management events at agricultural facilities not operating as solid waste facilities. The core change removes a prior square-foot cap on excluded activities and raises the on-site feedstock/compost limits, while authorizing further increases by regulation; it also establishes a separate excluded pathway for large-scale biomass management at agricultural facilities, subject to specific conditions and recordkeeping.

The bill establishes two primary components under the excluded activities umbrella. First, for standard composting of green material, agricultural material, food material, and vegetative material, on-site total feedstock and compost may now reach 200 cubic yards for non-public-agency facilities or 500 cubic yards for composting activities owned by a public agency, with the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery empowered to raise these amounts through regulation. Second, an excluded activity is created for the composting of agricultural materials and residues from a large-scale biomass management event at an agricultural facility that does not operate as a solid waste facility. This excludes materials or residues from whole or partial animal carcasses or animal byproducts other than manure, allows blending with certain offsite agricultural materials and manure under specified conditions, requires origin records maintained for at least five years, and limits the exclusion to not more than once every 10 years and to a total composting duration of 24 months. Regardless of these exclusions, operators must obtain all permits or clearances required by other regulatory agencies.

The bill also changes the handling of compost product distribution. It allows up to 5,000 cubic yards of compost product to be given away or sold annually under the excluded or enforcement-notification framework, with the Department empowered to increase this amount by regulation in contexts involving agricultural materials and residues from large-scale biomass events. Implementation relies on DRRR rulemaking to adjust these thresholds and on alignment with existing regulatory definitions for agricultural byproduct materials, agricultural materials, and manure, thereby integrating the new exclusions within the current regulatory structure. Although the excluded activities fall outside certain permit requirements, other regulatory oversight from local health and land-use authorities remains applicable where required.