Bottle Manufacturers Intensify Their Recycling Drive
Amid widespread reports that California’s recycling law is falling far short of its goals, glass manufacturers Friday announced a new effort to get consumers to turn in their empty bottles.
The industry’s hope is that it can stave off a doubling of the 1-cent-per-container fee charged to manufacturers unless there are dramatic improvements.
Under state law, glass, plastic and aluminum container manufacturers must reach a 65% redemption rate by June 30 or face the penny increase in fees next Jan. 1.
It appears that aluminum manufacturers will achieve the 65% target, but the glass industry is well below that goal, and plastic firms have virtually no chance of reaching it.
The centerpiece of the glass manufacturers’ new efforts is a $1-million television advertising campaign that began this week urging viewers to recycle glass containers. On top of that, efforts are being stepped up to collect glass products at bars and restaurants and encourage more recycling programs among business and charitable groups.
Costs to Industry Cited
Lee Wiegandt, president of the California Glass Recycling Corp., a coalition of glass companies and unions, said during a Capitol news conference that the increase in redemption fees could cost the glass manufacturers $36 million annually and threaten the jobs of thousands of industry workers.
The effort underscores the poor record of the glass, plastic and aluminum industries in meeting the goals set out in California’s recycling law, which took effect in 1987. Actually, the overall goal of the state law is a redemption rate of 80%, although there are penalties only if the 65% level is not reached.
During the six months ended Dec. 31, 1988, the last period for which statistics are available, consumers were redeeming 60% of their aluminum cans, 40% of their glass bottles and jars and only 5% of their plastic containers.
According to various experts, aluminum cans are returned most often because they are lightweight and can be easily crushed and transported. Because they have a relatively high value as a metal, manufacturers were encouraging recycling efforts even before the state passed its law. Glass containers, on the other hand, are bulkier to store and potentially dangerous if they break. Plastic containers, primarily two-liter soda bottles, are so bulky that consumers generally have not been going to the trouble of saving them for the penny refund.
Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara) has introduced legislation sponsored by a group called Californians Against Waste that would allow an increase of up to a nickel in the refund value of empty containers unless the 65% goal is met.
Mark Murray, policy director for Californians Against Waste, said Friday that although some Californians recycle containers for environmental reasons, the vast majority need financial incentives.
“The only thing that is going to motivate Californians to recycle at the levels required is a higher financial incentive. We think that is a nickel a container. A penny is a joke,” he said.
Howard Sarasohn, deputy director of the Department of Conservation, which administers the state’s recycling program, acknowledged that the state will not reach the 80% redemption goal established in the law. But he said he believes that the aluminum industry likely will reach the 65% target and declared that the glass industry has an outside chance if its public relations campaign succeeds.
The Department of Conservation, in a press release Friday, said that beverage container litter in California is down 42% to 45%, largely the result of the recycling law.
Even so, the department estimated that litterbugs drop so many cans and bottles that Californians could earn $6 million at current redemption rates if they turned them all in. The scrap and redemption value of cans and bottles left along California’s highways and rural roads averages about $10 a mile, the department said.
