Bottle bill: A nickel or just a nuisance?

Byline: Andrea Damewood The Register-Guard

Jo-Anne Morrison is tired of rejection.

Feeding her beverage recyclables into a machine outside the Coburg Road Safeway on Wednesday, bottle after inserted bottle reappeared, some denied because the brand is not sold at the store.

"It's frustrating," Morrison said. "If I'm here and I've got the bottles in my hand, I don't want to have to go somewhere else to return them."

In an attempt to revitalize slumping redemption rates of beverage containers, a proposed update of Oregon's bottle bill would uncork a number of new ways for residents to earn back a nickel.

Senate Bill 707 - passed overwhelmingly by the Senate last month and now on its way to the House - would, among other things, begin requiring large stores to accept any deposit can or bottle, regardless of whether the store sells that brand.

The bill also would require a nickel deposit on bottles of water and flavored water, which are too often tossed in the trash or on the ground, supporters say.

Locally, many embrace the idea of updating the bill, which hasn't been altered since its inception in 1971 - the first of its kind in the nation.

"It would be an added convenience," said Morrison, who would return her water bottles to stores, rather than recycle them at home. "We need to be recycling everything we possibly can, and if five cents is going to help, then great."

Though they stand to lose money if fewer water bottles are placed in their bins, local curbside recyclers also say any advance in recycling is worth the fiscal loss.

"We support recycling in any form, whether it's through commingle curbside service or bottle return," Sanipac CFO and acting General Manager Rick Wichmann said. "We're just concerned if those plastic bottles get recycled."

Both Sanipac and Lane Apex make money from water bottles they collect by selling them to a processor, where they can be converted into carpet, fiber fill or polyester. While both companies declined to say how much revenue the water bottles generate, they said the loss would be minor.

The state Department of Environmental Quality estimates that of the 126 million water bottles that are sold each year in the state, only 33 percent are recycled.

Though the recycling rate would climb if a nickel deposit were attached to water bottles, returns will probably never be as high as they are for beer and soda containers, DEQ solid waste analyst Peter Spendelow said.

"Beer is frequently consumed at home, and so is soda," Spendelow said. "With water, people take it out with them, and those bottles just end up being trashed because they're away from home. The number being trashed will be higher than cans and bottles."

Based on numbers from California - where water bottle recycling doubled after a nickel deposit was put in place - Spendelow estimated that the return rate for plastic water bottles would top out somewhere over 60 percent in Oregon.

But return rates for items currently covered under the bottle bill are also sliding. The DEQ estimates that Oregonians redeemed just 78.5 percent of their cans and bottles in 2005, down from more than 90 percent in 1973.

Currently, Michigan - the only state with a dime deposit - sees 97 percent of containers returned to stores. Nine other states have a law requiring a nickel deposit.

While the legislation en route to the House does not include any increase in the deposit, an amendment to require stores larger than 5,000 square feet to accept all beverage containers will hopefully spark more redemption, the bill's sponsors say.

"It all depends on the convenience of returning," Spendelow said.

Grocers see bill as burdensome

But grocers, large and small, say the expanded bill is anything but convenient.

They say changes to the bill would create a massive headache by flooding recycling areas with additional bottles and forcing stores to pay a nickel on containers for which they did not receive a deposit.

The existing law allows retailers to accept only the products they sell, helping to ensure that each nickel they give to customers is one that was paid to the store, Fred Meyer spokeswoman Melinda Merrill said.

Adding every variety of water, soda and beer would swamp the chain, where major stores handle a semitrailer load of bottles and cans daily, she said.

"Fred Meyer supports the expansion of the bottle bill," Merrill said. "What we're not sure about is: Why do we have to take on the cost and burden of stuff we didn't sell?"

Returned containers are collected by the distributors, who take back only products they sell, she said. The distribution of water, however, is not a monopoly like soda and beer - meaning water from Costco, and, say, promotional brands from car dealerships or day spas could stream into stores, leaving Fred Meyer with the costly responsibility of getting them to a recycler, she said.

Smaller retailers, such as Sundance Natural Foods, will not have to take back every kind of can, but adding bulky water bottles would place too great a strain on its small redemption room, said grocery manager Ron Leppert, who coordinates the store's recycling.

"It puts us in a big fat bind," he said. "It really puts the burden on the grocery business. I'm not against recycling - that's what this store is all about - but we want to see the state take some responsibility."

The Northwest Grocery Association introduced a proposal to legislators on Wednesday that would place a deposit on all containers, with stores paying a 3 cent per container fee to have the task handled at state-sponsored recycling centers.

Worried about lugging more cumbersome bags of bottles back to the store, some customers are also against any expansion.

Eugene resident Sally Chalkley said she but isn't thrilled with having to pay an extra nickel for her water. Her family drinks a lot of soda and bottled water, so she returns her containers to get back the money she spent.

"I spend a lot of money on (deposits)," Chalkley said as she returned several large bags with her son at Safeway. "It is a hassle to return any can, and I'm absolutely against putting (a deposit) on plastic water bottles."

A NICKEL A POP

Oregon's current bottle bill requires a nickel deposit on each can or bottle of carbonated drinks and beer. Distributors charge the deposit to stores and retailers, who then pass the cost on to customers. Distributors keep the deposit from unreturned bottles. According to the state's most recent figures, from 2005, here's how the pocket change shakes down:

Stores collected about 1.48 billion nickel deposits, for a total of $74.1 million.

Customers return about 78.5 percent of containers to the store, and get back $58.2 million, or 1.16 billion nickels.

The rest, about 318 million cans and bottles, are tossed or recycled curbside.