Comments on: Should a bigger better bottle bill include wine bottle deposits?

By: Taylor Eason

Taylor Eason — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 18:45:48 +0000

As someone who lives in a state without the bottle deposit system (Florida), it’s a crying shame that it hasn’t yet been embraced here. People are so desperate for cash ’round that I would imagine the extra $1.20 generated from returns might come in handy.

By: Bottle deposit reform could add $200 million to NY’s coffers | Dr Vino's wine blog

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 14:58:57 +0000

[...] Related: “Should a bigger better bottle bill include wine bottle deposits?” [...]

By: Wine bottle recycling is low – but some bottles getting lighter | Dr Vino's wine blog

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 20:54:10 +0000

[...] ever sees the light of day, hopefully unreturned wine bottles will not see the deposit go to the wholesaler rather than the state’s coffers.) Even though deposits are small where they exist now, the EPA report indicates recycling rates for [...]

By: Hey

Hey — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 01:49:30 +0000

In Ontario there’s a 10 cent fee for bottles less than 630mL and a 20 cent fee for larger ones (i.e. regular wine bottles and larger).

Basically no one returns their empties, since it’s such a desultory value compared to the price. 10 cents for a bottle of beer – or $2.40 per case – gets you a somewhat decent reward for your efforts (drinking and assembling!). Wine and liquor gives you minimal return (unless you have a serious problem or are running huge and high class parties). Basically the only people who return their empties are very poor scavengers who go door to door, students in their mass beer consumption days, and bars/restaurants.

The funny thing is that this fee was instituted on wine & liquor bottles despite very successful municipal recycling programs that were capturing most of the glass bottles. It doesn’t change anyone behavior, homeowners just put bottles out in their recycling to let the scavengers grab the bottles, and the tiny increase in price isn’t noticeable.

All these systems are huge scams.

By: Jeffrey Scotland Roy

Jeffrey Scotland Roy — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 16:21:29 +0000

With so many glass vendors and ID-OD configurations (screw cap and cork finished) I for one will not bottle any wine in used glass. The box and divider are actually more important and not prone to reuse. Lets see how the PET bottles that were used for some of the “Nuvo-Bojalis” went for the French this year. (4 brands tried them.) -One chemist customers said she would not drink wine from that bottle! I still want to get my “Cum-by-yah”s and go as green as posible.

By: Dylan

Dylan — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 23:54:53 +0000

$1 sounds amazing for a deposit increase, but where would that money come from? If 10 cents is currently the highest, I’d even say 40 or 50 cents would be a motivating increase.

As for Jimbo’s note, it would just require a standard of sanitization assurance. Without that assurance, people may not trust how clean the bottle they’re getting back is.

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 13:30:20 +0000

Just back from Costa Rica and they reuse all beer bottles, they are not crushed and recylcled but instead washed and filled back up to be resold. Just like the old days when I used to collect Pspsi/Coke etc bottles to be sent back to the bottler to be refilled. Why not create an incentive program for all bottlers to reuse their containers, juice, beer, wine etc? It will also reduce our consumption of plastics/fossil fuels. This is really where we need to head-we are swimming in the beaurcratic mess these government programs create

By: Weston

Weston — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 23:09:24 +0000

its 10cents in Vancouver, Canada here.

By: NNWSIDEWINO

NNWSIDEWINO — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 15:08:14 +0000

I am all for a $1 per bottle of any type bottle bill. Make it more than beverages only, like say oil containers, detergent bottles, shampoo bottles, etc! I also think we should hike out national gas tax .50c a year for the next 8 years to help pay all of the true costs of personal and commercial motorized transportation.

By: Dirty

Dirty — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 14:49:49 +0000

Like you mentioned- I drink wine mostly at home, and recycle all the bottles here. I do a lot of my shopping on foot, and I don’t really want to lug a bunch of empties with me 10 blocks to the grocery or package store. But then again, these aren’t put in place for people that already do the right thing…

Now if they made the deposit $1. I would drag them all back to the store.