The Product Lifecycle Responsibility Act  2025 (NSW) has been made, creating a framework under which product stewardship schemes may be established that will require brand owners to take greater responsibility for the environmental impacts of certain products throughout their life cycle. This article reviews the key obligations that will be imposed on ‘brand owners’ under the Act discusses the potential implications of the legislation

The Product Lifecycle Responsibility Act 2025 (NSW) (Act) has been made, creating a framework under which product stewardship schemes may be established in NSW.

Key Takeaways:

• The Act will operate as a framework legislation, under which regulations may be made to implement mandatory product stewardship schemes for certain products.
• A mandatory product stewardship scheme may prescribe requirements and targets for the lifecycle of a regulated product, including the development, design, creation, production, assembly, supply, use or re-use, collection, recovery, recycling or disposal of that product.
• It will be an offence to fail to comply with a product stewardship requirement. Fines for non-compliance with safety requirements will be higher than those for other breaches.
• It is expected that batteries will be the first product to be regulated under the Act. There is already a voluntary product stewardship scheme for batteries that has been accredited under the Federal Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020. It is not clear how these schemes will work together.

Key features of the Act

The Act will operate as framework legislation, under which regulations will be made to implement mandatory product stewardship schemes for certain products.

The Act provides that a product stewardship scheme may:

• prescribe a requirement for the stewardship of the lifecycle of a regulated product, including the development, design, creation, production, assembly, supply, use or re-use, collection, recovery, recycling or disposal of the regulated product, and

• specify a target about a product stewardship requirement, including a target expressed as a percentage.

The types of requirements that may be included in a product stewardship scheme are set out in the Act. They are quite extensive and include:

• the use or re-use of recycled materials and the ability of a product to be recycled, composted, repaired, processed, re-processed or re-used,
• the safe collection, transport or storage of a product,
• the prevention or reduction of unlawful waste disposal or unsafe product disposal,
• the maintenance, sharing, repair, refurbishment or upgrade and longevity of a product, and
• the reduction of the impact, of a product on resource management or waste management, including in relation to the demand for landfill and potential damage to resource recovery and waste infrastructure.

The regulations may also declare that a particular product stewardship requirement is a ‘safety requirement’. The penalty for non-compliance with a ‘safety requirement’ is double that for other requirements.

Key Stakeholders

A ‘brand owner’ of a regulated product will be subject to certain obligations under the Act and under the product stewardship scheme for that product.

A ’brand owner’ is the owner of the product name under which the product is ‘supplied’ in NSW. A ‘product name’ includes a trademark, brand name or trade name, whether or not registered in NSW or in another jurisdiction.

Product stewardship organisations will be responsible for the management and administration of the product stewardship schemes.

The EPA will enter into stewardship administration agreements with selected product stewardship organisations. These agreements will require the product stewardship organisation to enter into and give effect to arrangements with brand owners under which the brand owners will be required to pay to the product stewardship organisation fees for the cost of the management, administration and operation of the scheme.

Offences and penalties

A number of new offences have been established under the Act, including the following:

• Failure by a brand owner of a regulated product to comply with a product stewardship requirement for that product.
• Failure by a brand owner or product stewardship organisation to keep required records.
• Failure by a brand owner to give the EPA and the relevant product stewardship organisation advance notice that they intend to supply the product in NSW.
• Failure by a product stewardship organisation to comply with a stewardship administration agreement.
• Provision of false or misleading information in relation to a product stewardship scheme.

Lithium batteries – first on the agenda

The NSW Government has announced that batteries will be the first product that will be regulated under the Act, citing the rising number of battery fires across Australia as a key drive for this decision.

An Australia-wide voluntary product stewardship scheme for batteries already exists, that has been accredited under the Federal Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020 (Cth).

There is already an Australia wide voluntary product stewardship scheme in place for batteries, that has been accredited under the Commonwealth Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020 (Cth). However, it remains unclear how this voluntary scheme will interact with the new NSW mandatory framework. It is anticipated that the NSW scheme will have a broader scope, capturing embedded batteries in products such as vapes, power tools, and e-bikes. The NSW scheme is also expected to be more effective given it’s mandatory nature and focus on reducing fire risks.

Next steps

The Act requires that any regulation prescribing a product for inclusion in a product stewardship scheme must be publicly advertised for a minimum of 8 weeks before being made, and cannot come into effect until at least 12 months after its publication.

The Minister may, however, dispense with these requirements if the making of the regulation is urgent.

We expect that the Minister will seek to make regulations in relation to batteries on an urgent basis, although the actual time frame is not yet known.

The Commonwealth Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020 includes a provision requiring the responsible Minister to publish an annual ‘priority list’ identifying products that may be considered for future regulation under the Act. The NSW legislation contains no equivalent mechanism. Nevertheless, it is hoped that the NSW Minister will similarly provide advance notice of any products being considered for regulation under a product stewardship scheme.

Care will also need to be taken in relation to those products that are regulated under the Recycling and Waste Reduction Act 2020, having regard to section 109 of the Constitution of Australia, which provides that federal laws override inconsistent state laws, to the extent of any inconsistency.

Published on 29 April 2025.