Leftover Paint Overview

Paint and coatings products are an essential part of your life. Paint covers, protect and beautifies your walls, appliances, wood furniture, toys, automobiles, boats, bridges, roads, and just about every other object and structure you can imagine.

An Overview
A large amount of paint is purchased at the consumer level. Annually, almost 500 million gallons of architectural paints -- which include household paints -- are manufactured for do-it-yourselfers and painting contractors for residential and nonresidential use. This is more than half the paints and coatings sold and marketed in the United States each year.

But every can of paint isn't used up as soon as it's opened. Unopened cans and partially used cans end up in garages, basements, sheds and attics, becoming what we call "leftover" paint.

How Much Leftover Paint is Out There_
In early 1995, the National Paint and Coatings Association (NPCA) commissioned an independent survey on leftover paint. We asked 1,000 consumers nationwide whether they had unwanted leftover paint stored in their homes. Of the 749 who responded, 218, or only 29 percent, said that they had some leftover paint they no longer wanted. In fact, the average amount of leftover, unwanted products found in these households was a total of .375 gallons, including paint, paint primer, stain, aerosol spray paint, polyurethane/varnish, clear sealer, and paint thinner. Unwanted paint alone accounted for less than a third of a gallon per household on average.

"29 percent of consumers surveyed had some unwanted leftover
paint stored in their homes."

Figures from the national survey show that Americans tend to hold onto leftover paint for later use. Only 29 percent of respondents said that they dispose of the paint within the first 12 months after purchase, and more than 67 percent said they keep it for more than 12 months. Other studies have shown that, on average, households keep paint about 4.6 years before they are through with it.

Disposing of Leftover Paint
Once it's discarded, leftover paint becomes part of the estimated 3.5 pounds of garbage per day — or 1,300 pounds each year — that the average American throws away.

Some of this garbage is defined as household hazardous waste (HHW), and gets collected via special HHW collection programs. These programs help ensure that the disposal doesn't pose a risk to human health and the environment.

Paint ends up constituting 40 to 70 percent of HHW collected by local and state governments. While some jurisdictions collect and dispose of latex paint as HHW, this is generally not necessary. Latex paint, which makes up the majority of paint collected, is not considered hazardous by federal definition, or by most state or local regulations. Often, the leftover latex paint collected at HHW events is of good quality and should be reused, not discarded. However, even if latex paint is no longer usable, due to improper storage or advanced age, it can be easily dried and disposed of by homeowners in the normal trash, rather than transported to a HHW collection site.

"Latex paint is not considered hazardous by federal definition."

By the end of 1993, the number of HHW collection programs nationwide exceeded 4,000, and the number is continuing to increase. Over 600 such programs are held annually. Most of the programs are one-day collection events; however, some of the programs have expanded into multiple collection day events as well as the siting of permanent facilities.

Reducing the amount of solid waste — including leftover paint — that ends up in our nation's landfills is a very important environmental objective. That is why NPCA developed the consumer-oriented Six-Point Program for Leftover Paint, as well as the Community Paint Exchange Guide. These two programs empower you by demonstrating how you, as an individual and as a member of your community, can help the environment by properly managing leftover paint.