Baltimore Targets Beverage Giants, Other Companies in Lawsuit over Plastic Waste

SEATTLE (Scrap Monster):  Tired of potato chip wrappers and other single-use plastic waste clogging streams, littering public spaces and creating air pollution when burned, the city of Baltimore has gone to court to ask for relief.

City officials and their lawyers claim global beverage giants PepsiCo and Coca-Cola, along with six other companies, used deceptive business practices and created a public nuisance, while causing harm to people’s health and the environment, according to a lawsuit they filed late last week.

In doing so, Baltimore has added to a surge of plastics litigation amid a rapidly expanding body of knowledge detailing how burgeoning production and ineffective waste management damage the planet and threaten public health. The Baltimore suit, among the first of its kind for a U.S. city, claims the companies knew that discarded plastic would litter streets and contaminate waterways but instead left the cleanup responsibility and costs, in the tens of millions of dollars annually, to the local government.

The suit cites toxic air emissions from the much-fought-over, privately owned trash incinerator in Westport, where the city sends much of its waste to be burned.

Officials are working to make Baltimore “a greener, more resilient city” and “one that prioritizes the health of our residents,” Mayor Brandon M. Scott said in a press release. “But when bad corporate actors have harmed our city’s land and water, they must be held accountable, and that’s what this suit is designed to do.”

PepsiCo and Coca-Cola did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

But earlier this month, a PepsiCo representative provided a statement to Inside Climate News about similar plastic waste litigation in which the corporation is a defendant.

“Packaging waste is a serious issue that requires collaboration from many stakeholders,” the spokesperson said. “PepsiCo is focused on being part of the solution and is pursuing goals to improve and enhance recycling programs.”

Other companies that Baltimore is suing include W.R. Grace, a Maryland-based company that makes chemicals used in plastics manufacturing, and Frito-Lay, a Texas-based subsidiary of PepsiCo.

W.R. Grace also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount in financial compensation and punitive damages, including the costs to the city of “cleaning up and disposing of defendants’ litter, past, present, and future.”

A plastics litigation tracker affiliated with the New York University School of Law has counted more than 60 lawsuits filed since 2015 in state or federal courts.

Plaintiffs have included individuals as well as environmental groups such as Greenpeace, the Sierra Club and the Earth Island Institute. More recently, governments have begun to take plastic makers or companies that use plastic packaging to court. Some have cited the Clean Water Act, but often plaintiffs file their challenges based on public-nuisance or false-claims laws.

Baltimore’s plastic waste litigation follows an earlier lawsuit the city filed in late 2022 to hold six cigarette manufacturers responsible for tens of millions of littered cigarette filters, which are made of plastic fibers.

Courtesy: www.thebaltimorebanner.com