8 March 2006

Environment

Reverse Vending Machines

Ciarán Cuffe asked the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government his plans to provide incentives for the provision and use of reverse-vending machines for can, bottle and plastic recycling; and if he has met or intends meeting the providers of such machines.

Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government (Mr. Roche):

Directive 94/62/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council on packaging and packaging waste is based on the concept of producer responsibility, which effectively requires producers to contribute to the waste management costs of products which they have placed on the market at end-of-life. Under the directive, Ireland was required to achieve a 25% recovery rate of packaging waste by 1 July 2001, increasing to a 50% recovery rate by 31 December 2005. Practical implementation of the directive in Ireland is organised mainly through a collective industry-based compliance scheme operated by Repak Limited which is working successfully and in 2001 met the target of 25% packaging waste recycling required by the directive.

The EPA has reported in its National Waste Report 2004, published in January 2006, that packaging waste recovery increased to 56.4% in that year, indicating that Ireland exceeded its 50% end 2005 target one year ahead of schedule. This compares with a recovery rate of 14.8% in 1998. Work is already under way by the national strategy group on packaging waste recycling, which is co-chaired by my Department and Repak and involves key public and private sector stakeholders, to develop a strategy to achieve the 2011 packaging waste recovery and recycling targets required under the new Directive 2004/12/EC which amends the original Directive 94/62/EC on packaging and packaging waste.

Successful deposit and refund schemes operating internationally are generally located in those countries where there has been no break in the continuity and cultural tradition of deposit and refund arrangements. This is not the case in Ireland and there would now quite likely be significant costs involved in re-establishing deposit and refund arrangements here. The cost of storage for returned items either by retail outlets or in automated reverse vending machines - which redeem refunds to consumers based on the type and number or weight of containers deposited in the receptacles concerned - the additional transport movements and the costs associated with collecting returned items from the substantial number of authorised collection points that would be required, together with other ancillary costs and demands associated with operating deposit and refund systems, are issues that would have to be taken into account in assessing the adoption of such an approach in Ireland.

Deposit and refund schemes increasingly involve the provision of adequate national coverage of automated reverse vending machines. It is envisaged that the start-up costs associated with putting in place comprehensive and convenient automated deposit and refund mechanisms would be considerable. Account would also have to be taken of the possible impact on existing compliance arrangements. Given that these arrangements are rapidly achieving the desired result in relation to meeting the recycling targets, the introduction of deposit and refund schemes is not under consideration.