California AB 1826: Mandatory Commercial Organics Recycling

California Assembly Bill 1826 requires businesses and multifamily properties of five or more units that generate at least two cubic yards of total solid waste per week to arrange organic waste recycling services.¹ Signed into law in 2014 and phased in through 2020, the statute targets food scraps, yard trimmings, wood waste, and food-soiled paper so those materials stop decomposing in landfills and producing methane. One caveat matters before you read any further: since January 1, 2022, a separate law called SB 1383 has effectively replaced AB 1826’s volume threshold with a universal mandate, so even small businesses that once fell below the cutoff now need organics service in most of the state.

Who AB 1826 Covers

The statute defines “business” broadly. For-profit companies, nonprofits, partnerships, sole proprietorships, government offices, schools, hospitals, and restaurants all qualify if they have a physical location generating waste.² Multifamily residential properties with five or more units are also classified as businesses. Properties with four or fewer units are excluded.

The two-cubic-yard trigger measures total solid waste, not just organics. That means trash, recyclables, and organics are added together across every bin the business uses. If the combined volume hits two cubic yards per week, the requirement applies.¹

Under AB 1826 alone, multifamily properties had to recycle landscape trimmings, wood waste, and other non-food organics but were not required to run food waste collection. SB 1383 has since closed that gap for most of the state, so property managers relying on the old exemption should assume food waste service is now expected.

Businesses with customer seating must place organic waste bins next to trash bins in the customer area, with clear signage. Full-service restaurants are exempt from the customer-facing bin rule as long as they provide employees with organic waste containers and run an internal collection program.³

What Counts as Organic Waste

The law recognizes five categories:²

Food waste, including vegetable scraps, meat trimmings, dairy, and unfinished meals from kitchens or cafeterias.
Green waste such as grass clippings and leaves from lawn maintenance.
Landscape and pruning waste, including branches and hedge trimmings.
Nonhazardous wood waste like untreated lumber, pallets, and crates that have not been painted or chemically treated.
Food-soiled paper, such as greasy pizza boxes, used paper plates, and napkins. This category applies only when the paper is mixed with food waste.

Sorting accuracy matters. If organics bins are contaminated with plastics, metals, or treated wood, the processing facility can reject the entire load. The rejected material heads to a landfill, and the contamination can also surface during a compliance check. SB 1383 requires jurisdictions to take action when contamination in a sampled container exceeds 25 percent by weight.⁴

How SB 1383 Changed What AB 1826 Requires

This is where businesses most often get tripped up. SB 1383, California’s Short-Lived Climate Pollutants law, took effect January 1, 2022 and requires jurisdictions to provide organic waste collection to all residents and businesses.⁵ Where AB 1826 only reached businesses at the two-cubic-yard threshold, SB 1383 essentially eliminated that floor.

SB 1383 also swept away most of the AB 1826 exemptions. The old exemptions still apply only in jurisdictions holding a low-population, elevation, or rural waiver from CalRecycle, and the rural exemption has been extended through December 31, 2026.⁶

If your business checked its AB 1826 obligations years ago and concluded it was too small to be covered, that conclusion is almost certainly outdated. Check with your local hauler or jurisdiction on current service requirements.

How to Comply

Both laws give businesses four acceptable ways to handle organic waste:³

Subscribe to curbside organics collection through your local franchised hauler. This is the most common approach and usually the simplest.
Self-haul organic waste to a certified composting or anaerobic digestion facility. Self-haulers must keep records of where the waste went and how much was diverted, because local agencies will ask for that documentation.
Use a hauler that provides mixed waste processing at a facility designed to recover organics before disposal.
Compost on site if you have the space, managing the process safely and keeping records available for inspection.

Food donation is a related option that reduces the volume of organics you need to divert. SB 1383 layers an edible food recovery mandate on top of the recycling rules, tiering regulated food donors into groups that began donating in 2022 and 2024 and requiring written agreements with food recovery organizations.⁷ Federal law, through the Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act, protects donors acting in good faith from civil and criminal liability for donated food, with an exception only for gross negligence or intentional misconduct.⁸

Waivers That Are Still Available

Under SB 1383, two waiver categories replaced the older AB 1826 exemptions for most businesses:⁹

A de minimis waiver, available when a business generates little to no organic material of a particular type. A business producing no food waste or green waste, for example, may be able to skip the green container while still keeping a blue recycling container.
A physical space waiver, available when a business genuinely lacks room for additional containers. CalRecycle expects this waiver to become less common as businesses find workarounds.

A separate waiver application is required for each business location. Businesses located in a rural-waiver jurisdiction can continue operating under the old AB 1826 exemptions through December 31, 2026.⁶

Penalties for Noncompliance

For violations after January 1, 2024, jurisdictions follow a structured enforcement process. A business found out of compliance first receives a Notice of Violation and 60 days to correct the problem. If the problem is not fixed by then, monetary penalties apply:¹⁰

First violation: $50 to $100.
Second violation: $100 to $200.
Third or subsequent violation: $250 to $500.

Penalties escalate when the same requirement is violated multiple times within a single year. Jurisdictions may extend the 60-day compliance window when circumstances beyond the business’s control, such as natural disasters, permitting delays, or a genuine lack of local processing capacity, prevent timely correction.¹⁰ The dollar amounts look modest, but repeated citations add up, and the administrative work of responding to enforcement costs far more than setting up service in the first place.

1
CalRecycle. Mandatory Commercial Organics Recycling
2
California Legislative Information. California Public Resources Code 42649.8
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California Legislative Information. California Public Resources Code 42649.81
4
CalRecycle. Contamination Monitoring
5
CalRecycle. Statewide Mandatory Organic Waste Collection
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CalRecycle. Frequently Asked Questions
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CalRecycle. Food Recovery in California
8
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 42 USC 1791 – Bill Emerson Good Samaritan Food Donation Act
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CalRecycle. Department-Issued Waivers
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CalRecycle. Enforcement Questions and Answers