2011 Arizona Revised Statutes
Title 49 The Environment
49-831 Definitions

49-831. Definitions

In this article, unless the context otherwise requires:

1. "Agency" means this state or a state agency, county, municipality or political subdivision.

2. "Collection" means the act of picking up post-consumer secondary materials from homes, businesses, governmental agencies, institutions or industrial sites.

3. "Consumer" means a person who purchases a product for use, consumption or any purpose other than resale.

4. "Consumer of newsprint" means a person who uses newsprint in a commercial printing operation or in a commercial publishing operation.

5. "Disposition" means the transportation, placement, reuse, sale, donation, transfer or temporary storage for a period of not more than six months of designated recyclable materials for all possible uses, except for disposal as solid waste.

6. "Municipal or county solid waste" means any garbage, trash, rubbish, refuse, sludge from a waste treatment plant, water supply treatment plant or pollution control facility and other discarded material, including solid, liquid, semisolid or contained gaseous material but not including domestic sewage or hazardous waste.

7. "Municipality" means an incorporated city or town with a population of more than five thousand persons.

8. "Natural resources" means the supply of materials, not made by man, that are used for making goods.

9. "Newsprint" means uncoated paper, whether supercalendered or machine finished, including the type generally used for the publication of newspapers, commercial advertising inserts, directories or commercial advertising mailers, which is made primarily from mechanical wood pulps combined with some chemical wood pulp. Newsprint includes paper made from old newspapers which have been deinked, using the recycled pulp in lieu of virgin pulp. Newsprint includes all grades of paper sold as newsprint, supercalendered (SC) uncoated groundwood or machine finished (MF) uncoated groundwood.

10. "Paper" means newspaper, high grade office paper, fine paper, bond paper, offset paper, xerographic paper, duplicator paper and related types of cellulosic material containing not more than ten per cent by weight or volume of noncellulosic material such as laminates, binders, coatings or saturants.

11. "Paper product" means paper items or commodities, including paper napkins, towels, corrugated paper and related types of cellulosic products containing not more than ten per cent by weight or volume of noncellulosic material such as laminates, binders, coatings or saturants.

12. "Plastic container" means a container which is hermetically sealed or made airtight with a metal or plastic cap with a minimum wall thickness of not less than 0.010 inches and which is composed of thermoplastic synthetic polymeric materials.

13. "Plastics" means a specific polymer or mix of polymers in combination with various amounts of plasticizers, stabilizers, colorants, fillers and other organic and inorganic compounds.

14. "Post-consumer material" means a discard generated by a business or residence that has fulfilled its useful life. Post-consumer material does include discards from industrial or manufacturing processes.

15. "Process" or "processing" means the reduction, separation, recovery, conversion or recycling of solid waste.

16. "Recyclable material" means post-consumer materials which may be collected, separated, cleansed, treated or reconstituted and returned to the economic stream in the form of raw materials or products.

17. "Recycled" means a process by which post-consumer materials are collected, separated, cleansed, treated or reconstituted and returned to the economic stream in the form of raw materials or products.

18. "Recycled-content newsprint" means newsprint which contains post-consumer wastepaper.

19. "Recycled materials" means those materials which have been separated from the municipal or county solid waste stream, processed and returned to the economic stream in the form of raw materials or products.

20. "Recycled paper" means paper products which have been manufactured from materials otherwise destined for the waste stream.

21. "Recycling" means the process of collecting, separating, cleansing, treating and reconstituting post-consumer materials that would otherwise become solid waste and returning them to the economic stream in the form of raw material for reconstituted products which meet the quality standards necessary to be used in the marketplace, but does not include incineration or other similar processes.

22. "Recycling equipment" means any machinery or apparatus used exclusively to recycle post-consumer waste material or manufacturing machinery used exclusively to produce finished products composed substantially of post-consumer waste materials.

23. "Recycling program" means the program prepared and adopted by this state and approved by the department to implement the recycling program goals of this state or a program prepared and adopted by a county or municipality of this state.

24. "Reuse" means the return of a commodity into the economic stream for use in the same kind of application as before without change in its identity.

25. "Source reduction" means any action which causes a net reduction in the generation of solid waste and includes reducing the use of nonrecyclable materials, replacing disposable materials and products with reusable materials and products, reducing packaging, reducing the amount of yard waste generated, establishing garbage rate structures with incentives to reduce the amount of wastes that generators produce and increasing the efficiency of the use of paper, cardboard, glass, metal, plastic and other materials in the manufacturing process. Source reduction does not include the following:

(a) Steps taken after the material becomes solid waste or actions which would impact air or water resources in lieu of land, such as incineration or pyrolysis or burning for energy recovery.

(b) Replacing disposable material or products with alternative disposable materials or products.

26. "Storage" means the containment or holding of materials, either on a temporary or long-term basis, in such a manner as not to constitute disposal of such materials.

27. "Used oil" means any oil which has been refined from crude or synthetic oil and, as a result of use, storage or handling, which has become unsuitable for its original purpose due to the presence of impurities or loss of original properties but which may be suitable for further use and may be economically recyclable.

28. "Waste generator" means a person, business, government agency or other organization that produces solid waste.

29. "Waste stream" means the solid waste material output of a community, region or facility.

30. "Waste tire" means a tire that is no longer suitable for its original intended purpose because of wear, damage or defect.

31. "Wastepaper" means recyclable paper and paperboard, including high grade office paper, computer paper, fine paper, bond paper, offset paper, xerographic paper, duplicator paper and corrugated paper.