CARE Hits All-Time High Recycling Rate of 38.5%

Dalton, GA, September 8, 2025-On September 1, Carpet America Recovery Effort (CARE) submitted the California Carpet Stewardship Program’s 2024 Annual Report to CalRecycle, describing an all-time high annual Recycling Rate of 38.5% that exceeds the 34% goal for 2024 and shows non-stop continued year-over-year growth. 

This historically high recycling rate was supported by innovative grants, an active and growing collection network, a record number of pounds of carpet reused and ongoing development of markets for recycled carpet material.

CARE executive director Bob Peoples notes, “We are very proud of the progress this Program has made in diverting carpet from landfill and recycling it into new products. Our efforts at growing collection, reuse, recycling and innovations in market development have paid off. Recyclers have collected more than 1.3 billion pounds of old carpet in California since the Program started. 2025 is well ahead of our Recycling Rate goal, despite the toughest market conditions since the financial crisis of 2008.”

More than eighty million (82.7 million) pounds of carpet was collected in the state in 2024, of which 90.5% was recycled. Some 2.9 million pounds of used carpet were sent for reuse, a 249% increase since 2021. In 2024 there were 390 collection points for carpet in California, of which 159 were CARE public drop-off sites. 

Collecting carpet is just part of the story: the recycled material needs to find new uses. Manufacturers take recycled output processed from the carpet fiber or backing and incorporate it into new or existing products, including broadloom carpet and carpet tile, carpet cushion/underlayment, building insulation, acoustic insulation, water heater blankets, bedding, pellets, plastic automotive components, packaging insulation, erosion control products, lightweight aggregate, absorbency products and various cement-related products. In 2024, 30 vendors incorporated recycled carpet material in 113 products.

In 2024, the CARE California Carpet Stewardship Program managed 15 grants totaling $881,000 awarded to 14 entities, a significant investment that builds on the state’s carpet recycling success. Important advances were made in expanding convenient collection across the state, as well as tackling fiber identification and difficult-to-recycle post-consumer carpet (PCC) components. More than 680 jobs, direct and indirect, support the growing California carpet recycling industry.