Walking past the Custom's House early Saturday morning. Nice enough day for November. Not raining and according to my phone, the temp is 15C. It has a nice wide pavement on the river side but unfortunately struan across it were a mixture of beer cans and plastic bottles . As I was looking at this mess a thought came to me.
Years ago I lived in California and there they had what was known as California Redemption Value. This was a 5 cent tax on all cans and bottles, 10 cents on large bottles and bi metal containers. If you brought your cans et al back to the recycling centre you would be refunded your 5 cent tax for each item. Some supermarkets would have vending like machines, which would take your cans or bottles and refund you your cash. Last year in California they recycled 16.5 billion cans, plastic bottles and bi metal containers.When I first came across this recycling system I thought , " What a simple concept" . No rocket science needed here. it's a win-win situation. Our streets and countryside no longer need to be littered with the "King of Beers" or "Probably the Best Larger"
Now you may ask. Would this work here in "Green Ireland"? I think yes,it would work, but, and there are always buts.
In order for this to be implemented we would have to have a government that is actually capable of making an intelligent decision. So far, since the election, I have seen no evidence that they have this simple capability.
It is a bit ironic that this thought came to me while passing the Dept. of Environment, the body responsible for recycling and litter.
I will live in hope.
I fully agree. We have the same system in Germany (for glass bottles as well as most plastic bottles) and I have never understood why it is not implemented here. The trick, of course, is to keep it simple. In Germany, the system is now somewhat over-complicated with different bottles having to go back to different shops, which of course somewhat defeats the purpose, as the incentive thus quickly turns into a disincentive. But, in principle, YES, long overdue and hard to understand why non-existent here.
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