ICC Data and Bottle Bills

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Plastic Debris Rivers to Sea
Redondo Beach, California September 7-9, 2005

Pat Franklin Executive Director Container
Recycling Institute
Stopping Plastic Beverage Bottle Debris at the
Source
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Introducingthe one-way, throwaway can . . . 1930
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FACT There were no plastic beverage bottles in
the 1930s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and very few in the
1970s and 80s.
FACT In 2005 Americans will drain more than 50
billion single-serving PET plastic beverage
bottles . . . an estimated 40 billion will end up
landfilled or littered..
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Beverage Container Sales 1973-2003(in billions)
Container Type 1973 1983 1993 2003
Aluminum cans 10 56 94 100
Glass bottles 25 32 32 36
PET Plastic Bottles -- 4 9 48
TOTAL 35 92 135 184
Sources Aluminum Association,Glass Packaging
Institute, US EPA, US Department of Commerce,
American Plastics Council, Beverage
Marketing Corporation.
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PET Carbonated Soft Drink Bottle Sales 1992 -
2004
Billions of Units
Source American Plastics Council
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(No Transcript)
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A moment of refreshment
. . . an eternity of waste!
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Hawaii 2002
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A stream in Maryland 2005
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Beverage Container Debris Picked up during 2004
International Coastal Cleanup
of Items
Source 2004 International Coastal Cleanup, The
Ocean Conservancy
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Beverage Containers as Percent of Total Debris
Collected 2004 International Coastal Cleanup
28
72
Source 2004 International Coastal Cleanup, The
Ocean Conservancy
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Plastic Beverage Bottles as a Percent of Total
Debris Potomac Watershed Cleanup
2004

• The 108,575 recyclable plastic bottles (10,000
  pounds) collected during the 2004 spring cleanup
  accounted for 30 of all bagged trash collected.

Source Alice Ferguson Foundation, 2005
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Beverage Containers as a Percent of Waterway
Debris in Kentucky 2000
Beverage containers, carriers, tops and pull tabs
represented 50 of total waterway debris in SWaCK
Study
44
Source Litter in Kentucky, A View from the
Field, Solid Waste Coordinators of Kentucky
(SWaCK) 2000.
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How can we reduce beverage container debris in
waterways?

• Litter taxes

• Recycling programs

• Container deposit laws

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Litter Taxes
Litter taxes fund litter pickups and public
relations campaigns an approach thats like
mopping up the floor while the sink is
overflowing, instead of turning the spigot off.
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After 35 years and millions of dollars in public
relations campaign expenses Iron Eyes Cody is
still crying!
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Recycling Programs
Bin theredone that!
Despite tremendous growth of curbside recycling
in the 1990s beverage container debris has
actually increased.
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Curbside Recycling has not Curbed Beverage
Container Coastal Debris
Estimate
Sources Ocean Conservancy, U.S. Bureau of the
Census, BioCycle. Note 2000 curbside access
rate is an estimate based on prior year.
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Container Deposit Laws
Oregon Vermont Michigan Maine Iowa Connecticut Mas
sachusetts Delaware New York California Hawaii
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Litter Reduction After Passage of Container
Deposit Legislation
State and Source of Data Beverage Container Litter Reduction Total Litter Reduction
New York (Temp State Commission 1985) 70-80 30
Oregon (OR DEQ 1982) 83 47
Vermont (US GAO 1977) 76 35
Maine (US GAO 1980) 69-77 34-64
Michigan (MI DOT 1979) 84 41
Iowa (IA DOT 1980) 76 39
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Beverage Containers as a Percent of Coastal
Debris in States with no CDL
2004
18 national average
11 average in CDL states
Source CRI calculations based on 2004
International Coastal Cleanup data
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Beverage Containers as a Percent of Coastal
Debris in States with CDL

• Michigan, with a 10-cent deposit, has the lowest
  percentage of beverage container litter of all
  eleven CDL states
• With the exception of New York, all 7 CDL
  states were well below the national average of 18

Source CRI calculations based on 2004
International Coastal Cleanup data
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Beverage Bottle Can Debris Collected during
International Coastal Cleanup in U.S. (1996,
1998, 2000 2004)
Source CRI calculations based on date from the
International Coastal Cleanup Note 2004 data
for states that collected more than 5,000 total
items CA, CT, FL, GA, HI,IL, IN, LA, ME, MD, MA,
MI, MN,MO, NE, NJ, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC,
TX, VA, WA, WI, Guam, PR,VI,
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Refundable Deposits Work

• They provide a disincentive to litter.
• They provide an incentive to recycle and to pick
  up bottles and cans that are littered
• They stop litter at the source.

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We can do something about beverage container
debris today!
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They will thank us tomorrow!
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Visit us on the web at www.container-recycling.o
rg and www.bottlebill.org
Container Recycling Institute 1601
N. Kent Street, Suite 803, Arlington, VA 22209
TEL [phone] FAX [phone]
Email
container-recycling_at_container-recycling.org
CRI is a nonprofit research and public education
organization that studies and promotes
alternatives for reducing container and
packaging waste.