One such institutional innovation, now called "extended producer responsibility" (EPR), reallocates responsibility for postconsumer waste from the consumer or taxpayer back to the manufacturer through product take-back arrangements and/or product waste-handling fees. As firms compete to add value for the customers, EPR has emerged voluntarily in some settings, for some materials, and within some industries. These voluntary EPR arrangements are situated among a whole complex of other institutional innovations that share the common goal of reducing the environmental impacts of manufacturing processes and products. What distinguishes voluntary EPR arrangements from these other experiments in industrial ecology is one central feature–the reallocation from the end user to the manufacturer of some or all responsibility for products at the end of their useful lifespan.