Seventeen states filed a lawsuit on Monday challenging California’s Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act (SB 54). The suit seeks to block implementation of California’s packaging extended producer responsibility (EPR) program on constitutional and federalism grounds.

The coalition of 17 Republican state attorneys general is led by Nebraska Attorney General Mike Hilger and includes Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and West Virginia, together with the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors (NAW).

According to the complaint, California’s EPR law improperly attempts to regulate commerce occurring outside California’s borders by imposing packaging design, reporting and producer responsibility requirements on companies nationwide. The plaintiffs argue that businesses across the country are being forced to alter packaging and distribution practices in order to maintain access to the California market, effectively allowing California to dictate packaging policy for the rest of the United States.

The California lawsuit is the latest challenge to state packaging EPR programs. On February 6, a federal court in Oregon issued a preliminary injunction against enforcement of the state’s packaging EPR law as applied to NAW members, finding that serious legal questions existed regarding NAW’s dormant commerce clause and due process claims and that the balance of hardships tipped sharply in NAW’s favor. Trial in the Oregon case is scheduled to begin on July 13.

ILMA separately has filed a lawsuit in Colorado, challenging that state’s packaging EPR program. While all three cases seek to curb regulatory overreach, the California lawsuit primarily challenges the extraterritorial reach of California’s SB 54 program, arguing that California cannot dictate packaging policy for the nation. ILMA’s Colorado litigation, in addition to constitutional challenges, focuses on the disproportionate and unlawful burdens imposed on lubricant manufacturers under the Colorado’s EPR program.

“Together, these cases represent an important effort to ensure that state EPR laws remain consistent with constitutional limits and do not impose undue burdens on interstate commerce, including ILMA members,” said ILMA CEO Holly Alfano. “As currently structured, EPR is a hidden tax that disproportionately affects independent lubricant manufacturers.”

The California development is particularly significant for lubricant manufacturers and marketers because California’s SB 54 program applies broadly to lubricant packaging materials and could substantially increase compliance costs for ILMA members’ lubricant products sold in California.