Sponsors (5)
The bill funds research and monitoring to better detect and reduce microplastics in biosolids—improving information for farmers and enabling new treatment strategies and future regulation—but it may impose costs on utilities, farmers, and taxpayers and could take years to yield actionable results.
Farmers and rural communities receive better information about microplastic levels in biosolids applied to fields, allowing safer land-application decisions and reduced potential exposure.
Researchers and land-grant universities get funding to develop wastewater treatment approaches that remove or biodegrade microplastics, which could reduce contamination in biosolids and downstream environments over time.
Local governments, regulators, and farmers gain improved scientific understanding of microplastic fate and transport on farmland, which can inform future regulations and best practices to protect crop safety and soil health.
Wastewater utilities and farmers could face pressure to upgrade treatment systems or change biosolid application practices if research finds problems, leading to potentially significant compliance or capital costs for those operators.
Research outcomes may be uncertain or take years to translate into clear, actionable guidance, delaying practical benefits for communities and farmers.
Taxpayers may incur additional federal research costs if the program funds new grants or studies without offsetting savings.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Authorizes USDA grants to study microplastics in land-applied biosolids, including surveys, treatment development, crop/soil impacts, and fate/transport research.
Introduced July 29, 2025 by Jeff Merkley · Last progress July 29, 2025
Authorizes USDA research and extension grants to study microplastics (plastic or plastic-coated particles under 5 millimeters) in biosolids that are applied to farmland. The grants may fund surveys of microplastic presence and characteristics, development or analysis of wastewater-treatment methods to remove or biodegrade microplastics, studies of effects on crops and soil health, and research on the fate and transport of microplastics after land application. Also directs an amendment to an existing statutory provision governing research grants, but the text to replace the cited subsections is not shown, so the full legal effect of that amendment is unclear until the replacement text is provided.