New York’s Bigger Better Bottle Law
In April 2009, lawmakers passed the most comprehensive update of New York’s Returnable Beverage Container Law (known as the Bottle Bill) since it was enacted in 1982. This major grassroots victory will have far-reaching benefits for our communities and our environment.
MAJOR PROVISIONS OF NEW LAW
The new law makes a number of reforms to the current system, many of which go into effect almost immediately. The major highlights are the following:
EXPANSION TO WATER BOTTLES
The Bottle Bill requires a minimum 5-cent refundable deposit on beer, soda, sparkling water and wine coolers sold in New York up to a gallon in size. Starting October 31, 2009, the deposit program will be expanded to include water bottles under a gallon in size. Plain, flavored, and nutritionally-enhanced waters will be included, except if they contain sugar. New York joins Connecticut and Oregon which also recently updated their bottle laws to include water. This will dramatically increase the recycling rate for the 3.2 billion bottles of water that are sold each year in New York, which represent nearly a quarter of all beverage sales. This update means that nearly 90% of beverage containers sold in New York are now included in our deposit system.
TRANSFER OF UNCLAIMED DEPOSITS TO THE STATE
The Bottle Bill has never specified what should happen to beverage container deposits that are not redeemed by the consumer. Consequently, the beverage companies have held onto more than $2 billion of the public’s unclaimed nickels since the law began. Beverage companies will now have to transfer 80% of the unclaimed deposits they collect to the state’s General Fund, where this money will be put to work to benefit the public. New York joins Massachusetts, Maine, Michigan, Hawaii, and most recently Connecticut in requiring some or all of the unclaimed deposits to be transferred to the state. This measure is expected to raise $115 million in the first year.
IMPROVED OPPORTUNITIES FOR REDEMPTION
The Bottle Bill requires beverage distributors to compensate retailers for the cost of collecting and recycling empty containers by paying them a small handling fee per container. The handling fee spawned a cottage industry of small businesses called redemption centers, where people can take back unlimited quantities of empty containers. Many charities that run bottle and can drives have also registered as redemption centers. The handling fee has been frozen at 2 cents since 1997 despite rising costs, causing many redemption centers to shut down or take out loans to stay in business.
As part of the new law, the handling fee has been increased to 3.5 cents per container. This will encourage more redemption centers to open and expand, making it more convenient to return empty containers. Under the new law, smaller stores near redemption centers will be allowed to take back fewer bottles and cans. The new law also requires large stores (over 40,000 square feet) to maintain dedicated bottle and can return areas, and has stronger enforcement provisions to ensure better compliance. The expansion and handling fee increase are expected to create more than 1,000 new “green jobs” in stores and redemption centers across the state, including nonprofits in New York City serving homeless and low-income redeemers.
BACKGROUND ON THE BIGGER BETTER BOTTLE BILL
NYPIRG has a long history of working on the Bottle Bill. NYPIRG worked for nearly a decade to get the original law passed in 1982, and has played a leading role in subsequent efforts to update it.
The Bottle Bill has been the state’s most effective recycling and litter prevention program, with an average return rate of over 70%. More than 90 billion beverage containers have been returned and recycled since 1982, making our communities cleaner, keeping millions of tons of plastic, metal and glass out of the waste stream, and saving enough energy to power New York City for an entire year. In addition, the Bottle Bill has spurred a cottage industry of local recycling businesses, created a source of revenue for charities, and become a livelihood for many people who collect bottles and cans.
Despite the tremendous success of New York’s original Bottle Bill, several provisions of the law were in desperate need of an update. The law only covered beer and soda because it was enacted in 1982, long before noncarbonated beverages like bottled water, iced tea, and sports drinks became popular.
When we launched the campaign in 2002, noncarbonated beverages accounted for 22% of all beverage sales in New York (excluding wine and liquor), according to statistics compiled by the Container Recycling Institute. By 2006, their market share had jumped to 34%. Total sales of noncarbonated beverages in New York skyrocketed from 3.4 billion containers in 2002 to more than 4.6 billion in 2006 — enough stacked end to end to go all the way to the moon and back!
Along with that rise in popularity, we also saw an increase in beverage container litter, with water bottles topping the list. Litter surveys have consistently found that the non-deposit containers make up about 2/3 of the bottles and cans littering our beaches, parks, roadsides, and communities.
Without a deposit, most “single-serve” beverage containers end up in the garbage or in the litter. This is because people typically consume these beverages away from home and discard the containers accordingly. Onondaga County, which has one of the most comprehensive curbside recycling programs in the state, found that only 16% of plastic water bottles were recycled, similar to national recycling rates. In contrast, nearly 80% of plastic soda bottles were recycled, because of the 5-cent deposit on these containers.
The new law also resolves an issue that has been the subject of debate for decades — who gets to keep the unclaimed deposits from the program. The original law was silent on this issue, and as a result, beverage companies kept billions of dollars of the public’s money, abandoned one nickel at a time. Advocates for the Bigger Better Bottle Bill urged lawmakers for years to require beverage companies to return this money to the state, to increase funding for curbside recycling and other environmental programs through the State Environmental Protection Fund (EPF). The new law allows beverage companies to keep 20% of the unclaimed deposits. The other 80% will be directed to the state’s General Fund, freeing up more funds for the EPF, which was increased from $205 million to $222 million in the 2009-2010 state budget.
BENEFITS TO NEW YORK
New Yorkers will start seeing immediate results from the Bigger Better Bottle Bill. By expanding the Bottle Bill to include bottled water, New York’s deposit law now covers approximately 90% of the total beverage market. This means that billions more beverage containers will be recycled annually, preventing them from taking up space in landfills or becoming litter in our communities. The handling fee increase along with other incentives for redemption centers will help make recycling easier and more convenient in communities around the state and support green job opportunities. The new law also resolves the issue of what should happen to the public’s unclaimed deposits, by mandating that 4 cents from every unclaimed nickel be returned to the state. State officials project that this will generate at least $115 million annually to help fund important public programs at a time when the state is in desperate need of revenue. By increasing recycling, reducing litter, and putting the public’s nickels back to work for us, the Bigger Better Bottle Bill is a win-win-win for New York!
For more information about the new law, contact:
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)
Visit http://www.dec.ny.gov/chemical/8500.html or e-mail nybottle@gw.dec.state.ny.us
New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG)
Laura Haight, 518-436-0876 ext. 258, lhaight@nypirg.org
Joseph Stelling, 518-436-0876 ext. 268, jstelling@nypirg.org