Where Your Demolition Debris Actually Goes in Orange County

The facilities, the city ordinances and the refundable deposit that decide what your demolition debris really costs

Everyone in construction has heard that California requires 65 percent of construction and demolition debris to be recycled. Fewer people know that on a straight teardown, the code that says so does not actually apply to you.

That is not a loophole somebody found. It is CalRecycle's own description of how CALGreen works, and it is the reason the rules you actually have to follow come from your city rather than from the state. It is also the reason those rules differ so much from one Orange County city to the next.

Here is where your debris physically goes, who writes the rules that govern it, how much money the city holds until you prove where it went, and what you have to hand over to get that money back.

The rule most people have heard of, and the gap in it

CALGreen, the California Green Building Standards Code, is where the 65 percent comes from. Section 4.408.1 of the residential code requires you to recycle or salvage for reuse a minimum of 65 percent of the nonhazardous construction and demolition waste a project generates, or to meet a more stringent local ordinance if your city has one. The current edition is the 2025 code, effective January 1, 2026.

There are three ways to satisfy it. You can submit a construction waste management plan identifying what will be diverted, whether it is sorted on site or mixed, and which facility it goes to. You can use a waste hauler the enforcing agency has approved and let them document the 65 percent. Or you can use the waste stream reduction alternative, which deems a project compliant if it generates no more than 3.4 pounds of waste per square foot on low-rise residential work.

One detail in that first option trips people up: the plan has to measure by weight or by volume, not both. Pick one and stay with it.

And then the gap. CalRecycle's own guidance on CALGreen construction waste management states that a project with a demolition-only permit, one not issued alongside a construction permit, is outside the scope of the CALGreen building code, and that jurisdictions using CALGreen for construction and demolition waste should address recycling in demolition-only projects themselves.

Read that again if you are tearing something down and not immediately rebuilding. The state code everybody cites does not reach your permit. Whatever applies to you is local.

Which is why most, though not all, Orange County cities wrote their own ordinance. SB 1383 reinforced it: its regulations require jurisdictions to adopt and enforce CALGreen's diversion sections as an organic waste measure, because the lumber and landscape debris in a mixed load are organic waste, and to report annually to the state how many debris removal activities actually hit the 65 percent. That reporting duty is what turned a paper requirement into something city staff chase.

For context on the other numbers you will see quoted: AB 939 is what obliges every California jurisdiction to divert 50 percent of its waste, every year. The 75 percent figure that gets repeated is a statewide policy goal under Public Resources Code section 41780.01, not a target your individual city has to hit.

Where the material physically goes

A demolition job produces at least two and often three separate waste streams, and they go to different places at very different prices.

Mixed construction and demolition debris, the wood, drywall, carpet, metal, cardboard and plastic that comes out of a building, goes to a materials recovery facility that sorts it. These are the operations that issue the weight tickets with diversion percentages your city will ask for. The ones currently serving Orange County include CR&R's Stanton transfer and materials recovery facility at 11232 Knott Avenue; Republic Services' Consolidated Volume Transfer at 1131 North Blue Gum Avenue in Anaheim; Madison Materials at 1035 East 4th Street in Santa Ana; Tierra Verde at 8065 Marine Way in Irvine; Sunset Environmental at 16122 Construction Circle West in Irvine; Aguinaga at 16355 West Construction Circle in Irvine; and the Rainbow transfer station at 17121 Nichols Lane in Huntington Beach.

Inert material, meaning concrete, asphalt and rock, does not go to any of those. It goes to dedicated inert recyclers: Ewles Materials at 16881 Construction Circle in Irvine and 8200 Katella Avenue in Stanton; Greenstone at 32502 Ortega Highway in San Juan Capistrano; Griffith Company at 11501 Jeffrey Road in Irvine; RJ Noble at 15505 East Lincoln Avenue in Orange; and North American Recycling and Crushing at 1120 North Richfield Road in Anaheim. Ewles takes concrete only, and will take it reinforced, with wire or rebar still in it.

What is genuinely left over goes to a landfill. Orange County operates three: Olinda Alpha at 1942 Valencia Avenue in Brea, Frank R. Bowerman at 11002 Bee Canyon Access Road in Irvine, and Prima Deshecha at 32250 Avenida La Pata in San Juan Capistrano. Olinda Alpha and Prima Deshecha are open to the public. Bowerman is not: it takes commercial haulers only and requires a contractor's license, so an Irvine homeowner cannot drive a trailer to the landfill in their own city.

Published gate rates for the 2026 to 2027 fiscal year are $15 for a car or minivan under 360 pounds, $30 for a pickup or cargo van under 880 pounds, and $92.70 per ton above that, rising to $107.70 per ton for hard-to-handle material. The waste has to have originated in Orange County, and the scale house will ask for a driver's license, a utility bill or contract documentation to prove it.

A few things they will not take at all. Tires are not accepted at any of the three county landfills. Electronics and household hazardous waste go to separate collection centers. Treated wood is accepted only at Bowerman and Prima Deshecha, and only with a manifest.

No facility publishes its own diversion rate

This is worth being blunt about, because the internet is full of specific-sounding percentages. None of the major Orange County processors publishes an audited facility diversion rate. What exists instead is a certification mechanism: cities maintain lists of approved facilities they accept as capable of certifying the 65 percent.

Rancho Santa Margarita's permit package, for example, names CR Transfer in Stanton, CVT Recycling in Anaheim, Sunset Environmental in Irvine, Madison Materials in Santa Ana and the Rainbow transfer station in Huntington Beach as facilities that guarantee 65 percent diversion for city materials.

The practical rule follows from that. Do not pick a facility on price alone. Pick one from the list your city publishes, because a ticket from a facility your city does not recognize can fail review even when the material genuinely was recycled.

Every city does this differently

Orange County cities fall into three fairly clean tiers, and which tier you are in decides how much paperwork and how much money the job involves.

Tier one: a plan and a deposit

Irvine runs the most demanding version. Its ordinance requires 65 percent diversion, a waste management plan approved before the permit can be issued, and a performance deposit of $1.00 per square foot, capped at $50,000, collected after plan check approval.

Lake Forest requires 65 percent through the Green Halo system, with a deposit of 3 percent of project valuation, minimum $500 and maximum $10,000, plus a $141 administrative fee that is not refundable. Rancho Santa Margarita uses the same 3 percent, $500 to $10,000 structure.

Laguna Hills sets its residential deposit at 30 cents per square foot, with a $100 floor and a $3,750 ceiling, plus a $46.04 administrative fee. Commercial work is 50 cents per square foot.

Laguna Beach charges flat amounts by project type rather than by size: $1,102 for demolition or new construction, $827 for additions, $551 for remodels and renovations, and $276 for a re-roof with tear-off, plus a $61 non-refundable fee. Note that the city's web page still shows older round numbers; the figures here are from the current information sheet.

Aliso Viejo has the most unusual formula in the county: $50 for every estimated ton of debris, with a $500 minimum, and a sliding cap on larger projects that falls from 5 percent of valuation on a $500,000 job to 2 percent above $3.5 million. Its 65 percent is measured by tonnage, and a recycling and waste reduction form has to be filed before the permit issues.

Tustin requires a waste reduction and recycling plan before a building or demolition permit will be issued, with a deposit based on the Building Division's project valuation rather than estimated tonnage, plus a $50 non-refundable application fee.

Tier two: a plan, but no deposit

Anaheim requires a construction and demolition waste diversion application to be submitted and processed before a permit can issue, and documentation before final inspection, either all your recycling and disposal receipts or a recycling contractor's report. It holds no deposit.

Costa Mesa builds on CALGreen without a waste management plan or a deposit. Instead you declare at permit whether you are using a franchise hauler or self-hauling, and self-hauling carries a non-refundable fee: $165.28 for a project valued at $20,000 or less, then $165.28 plus $3.10 per additional $1,000 up to $100,000, $413 plus $2.07 per $1,000 up to $500,000, and $992 plus $0.52 per $1,000 above that. Documentation is due before final building inspection.

Tier three: CALGreen and whoever holds the franchise

Huntington Beach does not set its own diversion percentage. Its municipal code simply requires applicants to comply with CALGreen and applicable law on construction and demolition debris. The real local constraint is the franchise: Republic Services is the only trash collector permitted to operate in the city.

Newport Beach does require a demolition deposit, but it is not a diversion deposit. It is a franchise-hauler compliance deposit: you must contract a non-exclusive commercial franchise hauler for the entirety of the project, notify the city's Municipal Operations Division no less than 24 and no more than 72 hours before demolition starts, and the deposit comes back when the permit is finaled and you have shown a franchised hauler was used. The amount is set by City Council resolution rather than printed on the form.

Mission Viejo is the interesting outlier. The city's public works page states that its ordinance requires 75 percent of construction and demolition waste from covered projects to be diverted, which would make it the only Orange County city we found exceeding CALGreen. We could not open the underlying ordinance document to verify it, so if you are working in Mission Viejo, call public works and confirm the number before planning around it.

For the City of Orange and for Santa Ana, confirm directly with the city. Orange's municipal code does define the diversion requirement as at least 65 percent, but we could not retrieve the chapter setting out the plan and documentation process, and the only Santa Ana material we could find was a hauler's flyer rather than a city document.

The deposit math comes in four shapes

Across the county the same requirement is priced four completely different ways, which is why a contractor working five cities gets five answers to the same question.

Per square foot: Irvine at $1.00, Laguna Hills at 30 cents residential. Percentage of valuation: Lake Forest and Rancho Santa Margarita at 3 percent, Tustin on a valuation scale. Per estimated ton: Aliso Viejo at $50. Flat by project type: Laguna Beach.

And in most deposit cities there is a separate administrative fee that never comes back, by design: $141 in Lake Forest, $61 in Laguna Beach, $50 in Tustin, $46.04 in Laguna Hills. Budget it as a cost, not as a deposit.

The 60-day clock after final inspection

If there is one number worth remembering from all of this, it is 60 days. Laguna Hills, Lake Forest, Laguna Beach, Aliso Viejo and Rancho Santa Margarita all give you 60 days, measured from final inspection or project completion, to file the compliance report that releases your deposit.

What the report has to contain varies slightly. Irvine wants a post-project final report and compliance form including copies of all weight tickets, receipts or other documentation for everything disposed of and everything diverted. Lake Forest wants a final recycling report with weight tickets. Laguna Hills wants original receipts and weight tags showing actual tonnages. Laguna Beach wants it uploaded to Green Halo with weight tags, gate receipts, invoices and written subcontractor acknowledgements. Aliso Viejo wants receipts and weight tags to the satisfaction of the building official, submitted under penalty of perjury before the certificate of occupancy.

Do not expect the money back at final inspection. Irvine takes two to three weeks to review the report. Lake Forest takes four to six weeks. Tustin approves the report in about three business days and then finance takes roughly six weeks to issue the refund.

Missing the deadline is one of several ways to lose the deposit outright. Lake Forest lists four triggers: failing to submit within 60 days, hauling debris to a landfill, submitting a report showing diversion below 65 percent, and failing to demonstrate a good-faith effort. Laguna Hills forfeits for a late report or for unmet diversion.

Aliso Viejo is the one city where we found a partial-refund provision: its code allows a proportional return on proof that at least the required percentage of tons was diverted. Everywhere else reads as all or nothing.

One neighboring city is worth knowing about as a cautionary example. Fountain Valley's brochure states plainly that no correction or resubmittal of waste tickets is allowed, and that all decisions are final. Get the paperwork right the first time.

What a valid weight ticket has to say

This is the part that catches people, and it is probably the single most useful thing in this article. A weight ticket showing only a date and a tonnage can fail review.

Cities want the ticket to identify where the material came from and what it was processed as. Costa Mesa states that weight tickets must say the waste originated in the City of Costa Mesa and was processed as construction and demolition debris. Laguna Hills requires the same: the ticket has to identify the waste as C and D and as originating in Laguna Hills. Fountain Valley is the most explicit of all, requiring facility information, tonnage, the originating city, and proper coding indicating the material was processed as construction and demolition debris rather than greenwaste or general trash.

So a load that genuinely was recycled, at a genuinely approved facility, can still cost you your deposit because the scale house coded it as green waste. Check the ticket at the gate, not 60 days later.

Keep originals rather than photocopies where the city asks for them. Keep the approved plan. And in Laguna Beach, get your subcontractors to acknowledge the waste plan in writing, because the city asks for that too.

Who is actually on the hook

It depends on how the material leaves the site. Costa Mesa draws the clearest line: if you use a franchise hauler, the hauler is responsible for meeting the 65 percent. If you self-haul, the permit holder carries the burden of tracking receipts, calculating the diversion percentage and submitting the documentation.

The deposit, though, is posted by and refunded to the permit applicant in every city that holds one. The money is yours regardless of who drives the truck, which is a good reason to confirm in writing which party is producing the compliance report before work starts.

Exclusive franchise arrangements are a real trap for anyone bringing in their own bin. As of July 1, 2025, Lake Forest has an exclusive agreement with CR&R for construction and demolition services, and debris boxes or roll-off service from any other hauler are not permitted in the city, although self-hauling to approved facilities is still allowed. Huntington Beach allows only Republic. Newport Beach requires a franchise hauler for the entirety of the project. Costa Mesa requires a franchise hauler from its approved list, or payment of the self-haul fee.

Dropping the wrong company's roll-off in the wrong city is not just a paperwork problem. In Lake Forest it is one of the listed grounds for forfeiting the deposit.

Dirt and concrete are a different economy

Inert material behaves differently in every respect, and understanding that is usually the easiest way to clear 65 percent.

Concrete and asphalt are part of the construction and demolition waste stream and do count toward your diversion number, and because they recycle at essentially 100 percent at an inert facility, routing them correctly can carry the whole calculation. On-site crushing and reuse counts as well. Since concrete is dense and the calculation can be done by weight, an inert-heavy demolition clears the threshold quickly, which is a legitimate and entirely legal thing to plan for.

Excavated soil is the opposite. CALGreen section 4.408.1 expressly excludes excavated soil and land-clearing debris from the 65 percent, so hauling off two hundred tons of dirt neither helps nor hurts your number. It simply is not in the denominator.

What soil does affect is the bill, dramatically. At the county landfills, clean pre-tested soil is $4.00 per ton against $92.70 per ton for general refuse. That is a twenty-three-fold difference, and it is the strongest single argument for keeping dirt separate from everything else.

The catch is the word tested. Certification is required for loads over 5 cubic yards or 8 tons, and non-tested soil pays the full $92.70. The cheap rate only exists if the soil was characterized first, which means arranging it before the excavator shows up rather than after the pile is sitting on the driveway.

The private inert recyclers do not publish per-ton gate rates, so call for current pricing rather than assuming.

What this means for your project

Three things are worth doing before anyone swings a hammer.

Find out which tier your city is in, and if it holds a deposit, find out the formula and add it to the budget as cash you will not see again for a couple of months. Confirm which facility you are using and that it appears on your city's approved list. And agree in writing, before the first load leaves, whether you or the hauler is producing the compliance report.

Then, during the work, keep the inert material separate from the mixed debris, get the soil tested if there is any volume of it, and check at the gate that every ticket names the originating city and codes the load as construction and demolition debris.

None of this is difficult. It is just unforgiving about timing, and all of it is much cheaper to get right in week one than to fix in week nine.

One caveat, stated plainly

Deposit amounts, gate rates and approved facility lists all change, sometimes annually. The figures above are current as of this writing and drawn from city and county published materials, and practice still varies between counter staff in the same building. Treat this as a map of how the system works, not as a substitute for a phone call to the city your project is actually in.

Clear Path Demolition handles the sorting, the hauling and the documentation on interior and full-structure demolition across Orange County, and we will tell you up front what your city's deposit is going to cost you. Call (949) 603-3366 or request a free quote.