March 16, 2007

Boosting the bottle bill
BETH CASPER

Legislators in 1971 couldn't have dreamed of the beverage bonanza of today. Consumers can choose from countless concoctions -- red apple green tea, cool blue Gatorade, Power-C Dragonfruit Vitaminwater and water tapped directly from clouds.

Thirty-six years after the state's bottle bill ensured most of Oregonians' beer and soft drink containers found their way to recycle bins, millions of other beverage containers go to the trash every year.

The bottle bill put a 5-cent deposit on every carbonated and malt beverage, which consumers redeem when they return the bottle to the store where they bought it.

Dozens of attempts over the years to substantially expand the original bill have failed.

But 2007 may see a bottle-bill rebirth.

Trashed water bottles already have pushed the state below its mandated goal for plastic-container recycling. Several legislators are intent on including the more prolific containers in the deposit program. Others are pushing for a 10-cent deposit to create an even greater incentive for recycling. And still others want distributors to pay a handler's fee to the folks who take back the bottles.

So many bills have been introduced to tweak, expand or otherwise change the bottle bill that Sen. Brad Avakian, D-Portland, has legislators, industry representatives, state officials, recycling advocates and consumer interests working together to draft one bill. The workgroup's fourth meeting is today.

For Rep. Vicki Berger, R-Salem, whose father is known as the impetus behind the original bill, the issue comes down to the most basic of beverages: water.

Only 33 percent of plastic water bottles were recycled in Oregon in 2005, according to preliminary data from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality. That means almost 126 million water bottles found their way to the trash last year.

"The bottle bill doesn't solve all recycling issues. Nor does curbside recycling solve all container issues," she said. "If you combine the two, you have a darn fine system. But there is one item hanging out there -- it stands out there as the thing we have to address: That's water."

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The legislative workgroup grappling with changing the bottle bill identified different options in four major issues, which are encompassed in pieces in several bills, including Senate Bills 726, 481 and 634. There are three approaches within each issue.

Add water bottles and see how the system handles the influx

Add all beverage containers, except milk and medicine, such as cough syrup

Phase-in beverage containers

Deposit

Keep at 5 cents

Increase to 10 cents

Increase to 10 cents and add 3.5-cent handling fee, paid to grocery stores or a recycling center that handles the empty containers

Redemption

Keep deposit redemption at the place where product the was sold, such as grocery stores

Create redemption centers where consumers can take all containers regardless of where they bought them

Have a combination of redemption centers and grocery stores accept containers. The system would allow grocery stores to opt-out of redeeming containers.

Establish a handler's fee, which would help grocery stores manage additional containers or redemption centers to start up

Keep the system as-is and let distributors and grocery stores pick up the costs -- which may get passed to consumers

Give percentage of unredeemed deposits to compensate grocers who handle the product

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