The state this week sent letters to 2,300 Rhode Island businesses advising them it is time to improve their rate of commercial recycling, which in most cases is abysmal.

Coincidentally, the state Senate has scheduled a hearing for Tuesday to talk about ways to help communities recycle more and to find out why businesses and corporations recycle so little.

The new efforts are being prompted by much more than an urge to go green. The state’s Central Landfill in Johnston is expected to be filled within the next two years, forcing the state to explore options that include a $70-million expansion plan.

Some 60 percent of the wastes buried in the landfill, about 700,000 tons annually, come from businesses. But despite a state law requiring businesses to recycle, various estimates suggest the rate of commercial recycling hovers around 3 percent.

Terrence Gray, assistant director for air, waste and compliance at the state Department of Environmental Management, said state planners have been pushing for the state to coordinate more recycling. And municipal leaders have complained that while towns and their residents often work hard to recycle, most local businesses have done little.

One reason, Gray suspects, is that if a business person calls a garbage hauler and says he wants to recycle as well as discard waste, the immediate response is higher fees because the hauler will need to supply additional containers and make more trips. Another problem is that many haulers have no expertise or equipment to help with recycling.

But businesspeople who explore deeper will find that if they recycle large quantities, their tipping fees for wastes will go down, Gray said. If they package their cardboard wastes, recyclers will pay for them.

Just this month, Amgen, the pharmaceutical manufacturer in West Greenwich, was praised by the DEM for being one of the state’s top recyclers. The company reports it saved more than $50,000 in landfill disposal fees last year by recycling nearly 2 million pounds of material.

While state regulations require recycling 17 waste streams, Amgen recycles about 50 waste streams, according to spokesman Larry Bernard. By dedicating three employees to the work, Amgen recycled enough paper to save 1,100 trees and enough cardboard to fill 800 cubic yards of landfill space. It also recycles plastics, wood pallets, steel and kitchen grease.

“Management is fully supportive,” Bernard said. “It’s a good thing for the environment and we also want to be good corporate citizens. It’s the right thing to do.”

John A. Souto III, head of Waste Express, a Cranston garbage company that specializes in helping commercial customers recycle, says he serves some of the state’s largest companies such as Amgen, Hasbro and Toray. And he said there are plenty more he’d like to work with.

Souto said many companies don’t recycle because the state never enforced its own recycling regulations. Some don’t have the room or the proper waste streams. And some don’t want to be bothered with the extra work.

“If DEM can follow through and have the manpower to stand behind its rules, it would be a beautiful thing,” said Souto. He said his company already has the records to help customers fill out the state questionnaires.

The DEM letters to state businesses ask them to sign on to the state’s Web site and provide information about their wastes and recycling efforts by Feb. 15. The letter says the DEM and the Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corp., the state agency that runs the state landfill, will respond in late spring with efforts to educate and help businesses recycle more.

In February 2009, the state will begin enforcing the mandatory recycling regulations, but Gray said penalties have not yet been determined.

The new effort mirrors what was supposed to happen after the state updated its recycling regulations in 1996.

Companies with 50 or more employees were given deadlines for drawing up waste audits and recycling plans. They were supposed to renew the plans every year. And they were ordered to recycle 17 types of materials — aluminum, automobiles, cardboard, glass containers, laser toner cartridges, newspapers, office paper, plastic soft-drink containers, beverage carriers, yard wastes, high density polyethylene milk and water containers, steel, telephone directories, oil, vehicle batteries, white goods and wood.

Most businesses failed to respond. The state never set penalties for offenders. The DEM found it difficult to enforce the rules in a cost-effective manner and it finally transferred some 10 employees delegated to recycling to other tasks.

One of the problems, says Gray, was where do you do the enforcement? Some thought staff at the state Resource Recovery agency could enforce the law by inspecting loads arriving at the Central Landfill. But that’s messy work and the materials are often already left unmarketable by being mingled with other wastes.

The other approach would be to go to individual businesses. But that would require more resources.

Now, despite the state’s budget crisis, Gray said state officials have made a commitment to making commercial recycling work.

Gray said he hasn’t heard many complaints from businesses. A few, he said, have called to say that their staff levels have fallen below the minimum of 50 that requires compliance with the program.

Bethany Costello, spokesperson for the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce, said she hasn’t heard any complaints. She said the chamber is focusing on getting the word out to member businesses.

“I think people are really embracing green practices now,” said Costello.

Greg Pare, spokesman for Senate leaders, said the Senate has set one of its goals this year to improve the state’s recycling rates and lessen pressure on the rapidly filling landfill.

The full Senate is scheduled to hear testimony after the Senate adjourns Tuesday, at approximately 4:30 p.m. Senate President Joseph A. Montalbano and Majority Leader M. Teresa Paiva Weed are expected to make presentations. Then the Senate will hear from one panel that will discuss current recycling efforts around the state and a second that will focus on municipal recycling, which varies wildly among various communities.

Gray said the state will take a big step just by gathering the information from businesses and focusing on those that can do the most first. Key recyclables are cardboard and office paper.

“We’re not taking an enforcement-first attitude,” Gray said. “We’re trying to target assistance.”

Maybe the DEM can start close to home.

DEM staffers often express embarrassment that in its offices, which the state leases in Providence from private owners, comprehensive recycling is not provided.

“It’s a landlord/tenant thing,” Gray said.

plord@projo.com