The legislature finds that land disposal and incineration of solid and hazardous waste can be both harmful to the environment and costly to those who must dispose of the waste. In order to address this problem in the most cost-effective and environmentally sound manner, and to implement the highest waste management priority as articulated in RCW 70A.205.005 and 70A.300.260, public and private efforts should focus on reducing the generation of waste. Waste reduction can be achieved by encouraging voluntary efforts to redesign industrial, commercial, production, and other processes to result in the reduction or elimination of waste by-products and to maximize the in-process reuse or reclamation of valuable spent material.

In the interest of protecting the public health, safety, and the environment, the legislature declares that it is the policy of the state of Washington to encourage reduction in the use of hazardous substances and reduction in the generation of hazardous waste whenever economically and technically practicable.

The legislature finds that hazardous wastes are generated by numerous different sources including, but not limited to, large and small business, households, and state and local government. The legislature further finds that a goal against which efforts at waste reduction may be measured is essential for an effective hazardous waste reduction program. The Pacific Northwest hazardous waste advisory council has endorsed a goal of reducing, through hazardous substance use reduction and waste reduction techniques, the generation of hazardous waste by fifty percent by 1995. The legislature adopts this as a policy goal for the state of Washington. The legislature recognizes that many individual businesses have already reduced the generation of hazardous waste through appropriate hazardous waste reduction techniques. The legislature also recognizes that there are some basic industrial processes which by their nature have limited potential for significantly reducing the use of certain raw materials or substantially reducing the generation of hazardous wastes. Therefore, the goal of reducing hazardous waste generation by fifty percent cannot be applied as a regulatory requirement.