RECYCLING AND LITTER CONTROL
Public Policy Considerations
CURRENT CONDITIONS
The most recent “State of Garbage in America” (BioCycle Magazine, December, 2008) survey
places Michigan’s overall recycling rate at 20% of municipal solid waste (MSW); the weighted
average of our neighboring Great Lakes states is 30.5%; the national average 28.6%. None of
our other neighboring Great Lakes states has a mandatory container deposit law.
Expanding Michigan’s container deposit law to cover noncarbonated beverages such as water,
tea, and juices would likely increase the state’s recycling rate by only a fraction of one percent.
The current deposit law targets only about 3.4% of our municipal waste – 2.5%from beer
containers and 0.9% from carbonated soft drinks (based on national data). Expansion of our
deposit law to noncarbonated beverages targets another 1% of MSW. Since some of those
containers are already being recycled through community recycling programs, the incremental
impact to Michigan’s overall recycling rate from expansion of the deposit law would be notably
less than a 1% increase (we would still not even reach 21%)!
Comprehensive community curbside and drop-off recycling programs typically cover items
representing about 33% of MSW, so the potential to increase recycling in Michigan is significantly
greater if we focus on those comprehensive programs. It should also be noted that
noncarbonated beverage containers recycled through the state’s current community programs
help to fund those local efforts. Shifting those containers over to the bottle bill would cost our
local recycling programs thousands of dollars in lost scrap revenue.
Research places the net cost of recycling through comprehensive community curbside and dropoff programs at $100 to $150 per ton (before factoring in the savings generated from reduced
trash collection and disposal costs). Deposit programs on carbonated beverages cost $500 to
$800 per ton to recycle. Noncarbonated beverages added to deposit programs cost $1,500 to
$1,800 per ton to recycle these incremental containers. Thus, for the same cost to the public, the
state could expect to recycle under comprehensive programs some 4 times more than under a
traditional deposit system, and some 10 times more than would be achieved through a deposit on
noncarbonated beverages.
Regardless of what type of recycling program is in place, it is the consumer and the taxpayer that
ultimately pay for the costs of recycling. Funding may come from state or local taxes, recycling
fees, disposal fees, or higher prices for the consumer product. We owe it to our citizens, then, to
adopt for Michigan the most efficient and cost effective approaches toward recycling.
The current Michigan deposit law on carbonated beverages costs the Michigan consumer about
$200 million annually in increased beverage costs (our retail prices in Michigan are about a nickel
higher per packaged beverage than in surrounding states). If the law were changed to include
noncarbonated beverages, the cost to the Michigan consumer would increase by about another
$60 to $80 million per year.
It is really pretty obvious why deposit programs are so much more expensive than traditional
recycling operations. We know, for example, that Oakland County’s municipal programs recycle
more material than we recycle throughout the entire state under the bottle law. Yet in Oakland
County, only a single recycler needs to be used to cover a particular area, and that recycler would
never have to travel more than 20 to 30 miles. The deposit law, however, requires multiple
recyclers, each of whom has to service the same stores, and these multiple recyclers have to
cover the entire state – but for less material.
Beverage containers also represent a small portion of litter. Across 17 studies conducted over
the last 20 years in different parts of the nation, beverage containers of all types averaged 7.4%of
litter. On average, only 1.3% of litter was from noncarbonated beverage containers. Litter control
programs typically take the dual approach of implementing both a prevention and a clean-up
component. Even if expansion of Michigan’s deposit law to noncarbonated beverages were to
eliminate all such containers from roadside litter, almost 99% of the litter would still be there. As
with successful recycling programs, litter abatement programs in other states directed at the
entire problem have been found to be far more effective and cost efficient.
COST CONSIDERATIONS
Our initial consideration should be whether we advocate imposing an additional $60 million cost
burden on the public. While the retailers and beverage distributors first pay for the costs of taking
back the new containers, this cost is passed on to the public in the form of higher prices for the
product. At a time when our state faces a structural deficit, and the public is being asked to either
cut back on their expectations for public services, or pay more for those services, is a new $60
million cost burden on the public for recycling among your top priorities?
If a new $60 million cost to the public for recycling is your top priority, should it be done through a
deposit? For those who would be interested in the economic incidence of such a mandated state
cost burden, you should be aware that it is very regressive in nature. The cost increases
mandated through a deposit scheme do not recognize ability to pay. The single parent, lower
income employee with two children pays the same as that employee’s manager – yet it
represents a much larger portion of his or her disposable income.
Finally, the outcome of this $60 million cost to the Michigan public, if it were imposed through a
deposit system, would at best increase our recycling rate by less than 1% (that is, from 20% to
less than 21%). If we are really interested in recycling, why wouldn’t we instead put those dollars
into comprehensive curbside and drop-off programs that address a much greater portion of the
waste stream (thus promising a larger increase in recycling rates/tonnage), and at a much lower
cost per unit of material recycled? You get a much greater bang for the buck, and people can
recycle their noncarbonated beverage containers along with other papers, plastics, metals, and
glass, instead of having to take more items back to the store.
CHOICES AND CONVENIENCE
Right now, many people already put their noncarbonated beverage containers out with their other
recyclables. If they don’t wish to pay a dime up front and the extra nickel for their carbonated
beverages, they have other beverage choices they can purchase, and they can recycle the
nondeposit container with their other recyclables. Changing our deposit law to cover
noncarbonated beverages would remove that choice from the consumer; put a financial penalty in
the form of higher prices on those consumers who already are doing the right thing by recycling
their water, tea and juice bottles; and then make them lug the containers back to the store.
CONTAMINATION AND COMPLEXITY
New containers brought into the system by noncarbonated beverages represent an array of
different plastics, papers, foils, and shapes. The multiple plastics, if placed into our current plastic
container recycling mix, would contaminate existing material batches and render them virtually
worthless for recycling. To then separate the materials for plastics uniformity could cost more
than the resulting value of the uniform material. Of the new container materials, some have very
limited market value, and may have no market at all once collected.
Existing store sorting systems cannot accommodate all the new plastic materials. Nor can they
accommodate the foil pouches, multimaterial drink boxes, or the coated cardboard containers.
This would mean the store would have to either purchase and place a significant number of new
reverse vending machines, or multiple backroom boxes for manual sorting according to
distributor, or a combination thereof (some of these new containers will not be redeemable
through any kind of reverse vending machine currently available).
A return to the days of manual sorting of deposit containers, with store employees hand counting
and sorting some of the new containers, would be very costly to the stores, and produce long and
tedious waits for consumers.
A whole new array of food manufacturers and distributors would also be brought into the system.
Many of these have no existing means to remove their empty containers brought back to the
stores. Whole new removal and transportation fleets would have to be created beyond our
current systems in place.
In short, changing the current deposit system to accommodate noncarbonated beverages would
significantly disrupt and complicate our existing systems (and that is why the recycling costs for
these incremental containers are so much higher than under the current program).
REVENUES FOR COMMUNITY RECYCLING PROGRAMS
The plastic and metal containers for noncarbonated beverages represent valuable commodities
to community recycling programs. Recyclers typically do not want to lose those materials,
because it means they would have to charge their municipal clients more money to run the
recycling program. Two major recyclers, in New York City and in Connecticut, opposed
proposals to expand those states’ bottle bills in 2007 because of the potential loss of revenue.
The impact of expansion in New York City was estimated at $3.1 million per year; the impact in
Connecticut was $900,000 per year.
CONTROLLING LITTER
Many of the same dynamics operate for comprehensive litter control programs, which address all
litter, as opposed to deposit programs, that target only a small portion of litter. The State of
Texas, at an annual cost of less than $2 per capita, reduced its overall litter by 67% through
comprehensive education, messaging, and volunteer programs. Deposit programs cannot do this
because they cover only 7% of litter. Michigan’s deposit law reduced beverage litter by 88%, but
had no impact on other litter. The national research shows that when comprehensive litter
programs operate for more than five years, the roads are 40% cleaner than in deposit states.
Litter from noncarbonated beverages is very small compared to other visible litter. If you ever
volunteered to help with an adopt-a-highway clean-up, you would be aware that there are many
more bags, cigarette packs, old newspapers, candy wrappers, disposable cups, and even deposit
containers than there are water, tea, and juice containers that litter our state’s highways.
BECOMING A LEADER
What have other states done to become so much more successful than Michigan? Recycling
professionals will tell you that the two most important things to making meaningful improvements
in recycling rates are convenience and education. Convenience, by providing a service whereby
the public can recycle at one time a wide array of their recyclables; and education so the public
embraces the importance of recycling and understands how best to do it. This helps to establish
the recycling ethic.
Until we put the systems in place to offer convenient and comprehensive recycling opportunities
for our citizens, Michigan will never become a leader again in recycling. We must have a means
to recycle a lot more of the many other food cans, bottles, cardboard packaging, and plastic
containers we buy at the grocery store. Should we bring all that back to the grocery store? Of
course not. This is where we buy our food.
Plus, we need to recycle the things we buy over the internet, and at the hardware store, the
furniture store, and the department tore. Should we put a deposit on these items and require the
consumer to take them back to the point of purchase? Again, of course not.
Instead, let’s concentrate on increasing the participation rates at existing curbside programs.
Let’s also have curbside recycling programs available where they now do not exist. In areas
where the population density is not sufficient to economically offer curbside, let’s have convenient
drop-off centers. Both of these recycling opportunities are much less expensive to the public, and
can improve our recycling rates much more dramatically than by expanding the deposit law.
So if we are to impose a new $60 million cost on the public for additional recycling, let’s put it to
use where it can recover the most materials in the most cost effective manner. If we are really
interested in recycling, we will think beyond the bottle. Comprehensive recycling is an answer to
a lot more than just 0.7% of the municipal solid waste stream.
May, 2009