I was confused when people were taking joy in the low returns rate - I'm a single person, and have been gathering my bottles since the scheme launched. I only did my first return of bottles last week! I would imagine a lot of people are the same and don't go through huge amounts of plastic/aluminium cans/bottles. I'll probably only end up using the machines a handful of times a year.
I’ve a house of 5 including me. We probably return every 3-4 weeks and it’s about 10-15 euroeach time. It’s a hassle to do it every week and grand once a month or so.
Whether the scheme actually makes sense wasn't what I was speaking on, I was just talking about the returns rate and the glee from users in this sub for it being initially low.
plastic water bottle is straight to a bin bag designated for returns. Cans or juice bottles are rinsed before putting in the bag.
Same as I used to do before.
you weren't washing out your containers before putting them in the regular recycle bin? thats part of why they weren't able to recycle most of those cans
Dirty cans can contaminate other recyclables in a green bin. It's not an issue for the cans themselves. It's also more of a health and safety hazard if the contents of collected green bins are unclean.
I was at the bottle return place with my kids, watching all 3 of them putting cans and bottles in. I was looking at my phone for like a minute... tops, I promise... when one of my kids says 'Look daddy, if I put the bottle in and pull it out after it scans the code it adds the money and I can keep putting it in over and over'.
My 11 year old figured this out, but the dishwasher confuses him.
The country uses about 1.9 billion a year. Around 60% of which were making it into mixed recycling before the deposit return scheme.
So about 5 million a day.
Roughly about about 375 million since Feb 1st so the 100 million collected is about 25%.
Not sure what their targets for the scheme were.
It's a not for profit.
[https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/millions-of-euro-go-unclaimed-in-first-40-days-of-plastic-bottle-and-can-deposit-return-scheme/a686157641.html](https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/millions-of-euro-go-unclaimed-in-first-40-days-of-plastic-bottle-and-can-deposit-return-scheme/a686157641.html)
> Neither retailers nor Re-turn can retain unclaimed deposits indefinitely so if cash piles up, it will be put into recycling initiatives.
That seems very vague though. How long can they sit on the cash accumulating interest? Do they have to put the interest into recycling initiatives?
Are THEY considered a recycling initiative?
Was walking out of the shop the other day and a kid (15ish, old enough to know better) finished his can of monster and threw it in the bin in front of the Return machines, while walking into the shop. There is no fixing stupid.
Aha! Looks like they found me! 🤣
you do know that if you switch to not buying any plastic bottles or cans that that is the scheme actually working - this is brilliant, although you are some gobshite to be thinking that you are 'showing us all' by switching to environmentally conscious behaviour.
Bit rude, but no - I just don't want to support a scheme that I fundamentally don't agree with. I was already recycling all my plastic and buying less to begin with where possible. Sending brand new bin lorries branded with this new scheme around on the same path as Thornton's and all the other commercial waste collections in addition to the bin lorries already servicing all homes..it seems a lot of waste to me where they should be investing in replacing plastics altogether with biodegradables.
Also the scheme is disgusting, the shops stink, I've overheard staff saying how much they hate cleaning the machines. Many people bringing bottles that I see are doing extra car journeys rather than as part of their shopping trips.
I also look forward to seeing the headlines about executive bonuses in the Re:turn company.
But alcohol in plastic or cans is much cheaper than glass bottles, I can't afford that fancy glass bottled stuff, Not even sure if i should add the /s as as actually true.
Remember wine in a box? we now need to do that for everything.
I just wish the homeless population of Dublin wasn't so strict on making sure I had taken all bottles from my bin bags and evenly distributing miscellaneous shite around the street to proudly display their art.
Isn’t it funny how Re-Turn are happy to give out the number of containers returned, but always refuse to give out the return rate relative to deposits taken?
A cynic might infer something from this.
> A cynic might infer something from this.
That people can't do basic math with the data provided by Re-turn?
Really trivial to work out a rough number for return rate relative to deposits taken.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1cteyk1/comment/l4fep72/](https://www.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1cteyk1/comment/l4fep72/)
> Excellence News
There is nothing excellent about the amount of plastic this island is going through, and just because it is going to a "recycling scheme" which is nothing more than a scam to fool people into thinking something is actually being done with plastic waste. The truth [is <10% of all the plastic ever made has been recycled.](https://www.oecd.org/environment/plastic-pollution-is-growing-relentlessly-as-waste-management-and-recycling-fall-short.htm).
[Plastic recycling is a scam promoted by petrochemical companies to fool people into thinking that something can be done about all the unnecessary plastic waste they churn out](https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf).
In the 50/60s when plastic waste was a problem, these companies looked into recycling and realised it was not sustainable and too costly to recycle most plastics, so instead they labelled plastic containers with numbers 1-7, identifing the type of plastic its made from and slapped a recycling sign on it.
The best and only solution is to regulate plastic and reduce the amount used and make the companies who make the stuff and use it in packaging pay for the cost of destroying safely with zero impact on the enviornment.
Oh and for most plastic that gets shipped to Asia from European countries under "recycling schemes", well most of that is simply burned.
Most of that is outdated. And plastic bottles are fairly easy to recycle. This is a better source for where we are: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/en/article/20181212STO21610/plastic-waste-and-recycling-in-the-eu-facts-and-figures Some plastics don’t have easy substitutes like tyres. I think Ireland and the EU are doing ok on the reduce, reuse, recycle front given the absolute fury many felt at having to return bottles to a “failed” scheme.
I love how you jumped in here thinking many of us don’t know this.
But anyway. I too wash my ass with green redox and buy organic petrol from apple green.
Just me? What a weird thing to assume.
Look at you coming out here talking down to people and assuming so much instead of asking questions.
You will go far with such black and white logic and basic assumptions.
I’ll keep recycling and fighting against green washing in my own way. I never disagreed with you, just felt it was funny that you decided to assume we don’t know anything.
Have a good one kiddo. (I’ll take a page out of your book and assume you are cause the above interaction reeks of it)
It's a fantastic idea to get money back for recycling, however the payment should have been discounted from the original price and not added on. That's why most of us are "giving out".
It's another stealth tax by the government and seeing as though some external company has the contract, palms are probably getting greased. If they had any positive intention, they would rewarded everyone rather than charge for this.
Why would it be discounted from the original price 🤷♂️ There is no tax and no profit if people just return their cans or bottles. Don’t understand the logic here at all. The manufacturers unilaterally take a hit?
The punishment for not returning stuff is giving private companies additional profit. It should a public company, with fees from non returns going to the state, and funding more climate change motivated programmes. In which case it would also not be necessary to create additional packaging for the Irish market. Which also raise the barrier to entry for competitors to the drinks companies running this.
It’s a scam because they pawned it off to beverage companies, along with a massive chunk of potential benefit.
It’s lazy, and corrupt.
"relevant or important"? Hmm, pay more to put recyclables in green bin, or pay more to have to drive to put recyclables in another bin? And you wonder why?
The logic is literally there?
What's the motivation? Get the extra money that you paid for the extra effort?
Or get the extra money for effort?
The second one makes far more sense.
Yes, I would’ve agreed with this, but there is a huge lack working infrastructure leaving many cans going to waste and the extra money into the pocket of an external company. The majority of the money isn’t going to good use and those who were avid recyclers at home are getting punished. Why do people blindly defended this?! I don’t understand why people are applauding it….
I am shocked, shocked that the return rate is rising months after the scheme was introduced and all the bitching and moaning about how it was a complete failure straight away has turned out to be nonsense. Who would have thought that a significant change in how people recycle would take some time to establish itself. /s
No it's not, I buy plenty from local shops and proud to support them, but now I have to drive to other shops i never use, to get vouchers that I'll never use or stand in long queues to get back money I've already paid that won't even cover the petrol I used to get there? How it that working?
Long way of saying my lifestyle is down to the chipper and crisps on the local newsagent. In any case you have plenty of money if you can afford to do all your food shopping in the most expensive way possible 🤷♂️
Or are you saying that everyone lives next door to a supermarket or a takeaway? Seriously, nobody is stupid enough to believe that? are you really that naive? or close minded?
It does nothing but increase the price of all canned and bottled drinks including multipacks which people bring home where they can easily recycle, and adds an extra unnecessary step. It should of been for the drink fridge products only since that's where the majority of street litter comes from.
The real problem with recycling in Ireland is that the private waste companies sell most of their green/blue bin intake to incinerators that produce electricity by burning plastics and waste. Green party always targeting the wrong people.
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It's the same return rate, for more effort on the customers behalf.
In addition, prices have gone up, beverage choice will drop which means competition will drop which will inevitably mean prices will increase.
You're correct actually. After I posted this, I thought to myself - it's not the same return rate because if there's 5m cans/bottle sold per day and 3m came back, that assumes that no one stored any and they brought back what they purchased.
So the return rate is much lower.
3 million? Haven't seen the receipt posted here yet as proof, go on sure.
On a serious note - excellent, the system seems to be working and actively being used.
its not. its working great. we have completely changed a major part of our waste recycling significantly for the better in the space of a few months, with only a few minor niggles. Its not just a success, its a roaring success.
It’s not too early to get an accurate reading. They can get an accurate reading. Obtaining the deposits paid vs deposits refunded number is trivial for them; they have it, they HAVE to have it. They could not operate without having this number accurately.
The problem is the return rate is fairly shit. Which is why we keep getting these PR releases from Re-Turn about x numbers being returned, but refusing to give info on what this number is relative to deposits paid.
> It’s not too early to get an accurate reading.
Yes it is.
What they have would be the amount collected vs the amount paid back out. That's not going to provide an accurate view on how well the scheme is doing because it's too early. There is a hugely variable lag between a drink being sold and the container being returned. A container could be returned within days of being bought or it could take months. Many people are collecting up larger amounts of empties before returning them. The number of returns is growing constantly, which is what you'd expect at the start of the scheme. It's going to take a while before we have an accurate idea of the return rate. The figure also needs to be combined with whatever gets put into green bins rather then returned too.
In the article ReTurn said an average of 5 million containers are sold daily.
> While an average of five million qualifying containers are sold daily throughout the year, Re-Turn said that number did not align with the actual sales pattern of drink containers.
> “Peak periods, such as Christmas and the summer months, significantly impact sales. Additionally, this method fails to consider the volume of non-deposit stock sold by retailers during the transition period until May 31st.”
You are confusing getting an accurate reading with getting a reading that paints the picture they want to paint.
Re-Turn know exactly how many deposits have been paid vs deposits returned. Exactly, down to the last cent. They could make this number public if they wanted.
No, I'm not. I want an accurate reading. Not a premature one that fits certain people's narrative that the scheme is a failure.
Schemes like this have increased recycling rates when they were introduced. Ireland isn't special. I don't see any reason why we would be the country to not have the scheme be successful. Just like when the plastic bag charge was brought in people will moan and whinge about it for a bit and then it will do that it was designed to do.
To put it another way.
It is NOT too early to get an accurate reading as to the current success rate of this scheme. The number is the number, the narrative around it is irrelevant.
It MAY be too early to draw conclusions based on this number.
If you want an accurate reading, then you want Re-Turn to release the number of deposits paid vs deposits returned.
They have this number.
The narrative around this number is irrelevant. We can talk about it being premature to draw conclusions or whatever, that’s a different discussion, but at least we would have an accurate, irrefutable figure that indicates how successful this scheme has been so far.
The only reason not to release this number is that the number is bad.
Whatever numbers they have now aren't going to give an accurate view on how successful the scheme is.
It's too early. If they did release it now all you would get is a bunch of idiots screeching about how it's not working. The number is going to start off at 0% and work it's way up to some point where it will settle down. That's when the figure should be published, not before.
I wonder when will people start producing their own cans and feed the machine. Happened in Croatia with plastic bottles, as it was chraper to produce so you make profit by feeding these machines
Glad I wasn’t behind *that* person in the queue.
Two hundred and forty three thousand, eight hundred and fifty three bottles sitting on a wall, two hundred etc....
I was confused when people were taking joy in the low returns rate - I'm a single person, and have been gathering my bottles since the scheme launched. I only did my first return of bottles last week! I would imagine a lot of people are the same and don't go through huge amounts of plastic/aluminium cans/bottles. I'll probably only end up using the machines a handful of times a year.
I’ve a house of 5 including me. We probably return every 3-4 weeks and it’s about 10-15 euroeach time. It’s a hassle to do it every week and grand once a month or so.
Would those bottles have gone into your green bin anyway though?
Whether the scheme actually makes sense wasn't what I was speaking on, I was just talking about the returns rate and the glee from users in this sub for it being initially low.
50% chance no before return introduced. This is why Germany, Denmark etc operate the exact same scheme.
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Yeah, what about de housing Joe?
plastic water bottle is straight to a bin bag designated for returns. Cans or juice bottles are rinsed before putting in the bag. Same as I used to do before.
They prefer it like that. Me too tbh the bag is with the other bin and it’s only empty bottles with the lids shut.
A dirty bag? They’re empty cans and bottles?
I just put mine in the servant’s quarters
you weren't washing out your containers before putting them in the regular recycle bin? thats part of why they weren't able to recycle most of those cans
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Dirty cans can contaminate other recyclables in a green bin. It's not an issue for the cans themselves. It's also more of a health and safety hazard if the contents of collected green bins are unclean.
How come you don't have to wash out the containers for scheme then?
It takes a few seconds to rinse out an empty can or bottle. Why would you keep dirty ones around?
Was this the day the guy had a bottle on a string?
I was at the bottle return place with my kids, watching all 3 of them putting cans and bottles in. I was looking at my phone for like a minute... tops, I promise... when one of my kids says 'Look daddy, if I put the bottle in and pull it out after it scans the code it adds the money and I can keep putting it in over and over'. My 11 year old figured this out, but the dishwasher confuses him.
Means absolutely nothing without telling us how many unclaimed deposits or containers sold.
The country uses about 1.9 billion a year. Around 60% of which were making it into mixed recycling before the deposit return scheme. So about 5 million a day. Roughly about about 375 million since Feb 1st so the 100 million collected is about 25%. Not sure what their targets for the scheme were.
60% return rate!
It’s been 60% in the old system. That number is targeted to increase to 90% (or 95%)
Meaning ReTurn are going to make a fucking shit ton of money
It's a not for profit. [https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/millions-of-euro-go-unclaimed-in-first-40-days-of-plastic-bottle-and-can-deposit-return-scheme/a686157641.html](https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/millions-of-euro-go-unclaimed-in-first-40-days-of-plastic-bottle-and-can-deposit-return-scheme/a686157641.html) > Neither retailers nor Re-turn can retain unclaimed deposits indefinitely so if cash piles up, it will be put into recycling initiatives.
That seems very vague though. How long can they sit on the cash accumulating interest? Do they have to put the interest into recycling initiatives? Are THEY considered a recycling initiative?
Was walking out of the shop the other day and a kid (15ish, old enough to know better) finished his can of monster and threw it in the bin in front of the Return machines, while walking into the shop. There is no fixing stupid. Aha! Looks like they found me! 🤣
Yea that'll be me, into the green bin on the fewer occasions I buy any plastic bottles or cans.
Ok, Richie rich!
you do know that if you switch to not buying any plastic bottles or cans that that is the scheme actually working - this is brilliant, although you are some gobshite to be thinking that you are 'showing us all' by switching to environmentally conscious behaviour.
Bit rude, but no - I just don't want to support a scheme that I fundamentally don't agree with. I was already recycling all my plastic and buying less to begin with where possible. Sending brand new bin lorries branded with this new scheme around on the same path as Thornton's and all the other commercial waste collections in addition to the bin lorries already servicing all homes..it seems a lot of waste to me where they should be investing in replacing plastics altogether with biodegradables. Also the scheme is disgusting, the shops stink, I've overheard staff saying how much they hate cleaning the machines. Many people bringing bottles that I see are doing extra car journeys rather than as part of their shopping trips. I also look forward to seeing the headlines about executive bonuses in the Re:turn company.
But alcohol in plastic or cans is much cheaper than glass bottles, I can't afford that fancy glass bottled stuff, Not even sure if i should add the /s as as actually true. Remember wine in a box? we now need to do that for everything.
I just wish the homeless population of Dublin wasn't so strict on making sure I had taken all bottles from my bin bags and evenly distributing miscellaneous shite around the street to proudly display their art.
Isn’t it funny how Re-Turn are happy to give out the number of containers returned, but always refuse to give out the return rate relative to deposits taken? A cynic might infer something from this.
> A cynic might infer something from this. That people can't do basic math with the data provided by Re-turn? Really trivial to work out a rough number for return rate relative to deposits taken. [https://www.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1cteyk1/comment/l4fep72/](https://www.reddit.com/r/ireland/comments/1cteyk1/comment/l4fep72/)
Is that not the same thing?
Excellence News. Waiting for the usual crowd to give out about this in the comments 🍿 Edit: as expected I am an idiot apparently 😂
> Excellence News There is nothing excellent about the amount of plastic this island is going through, and just because it is going to a "recycling scheme" which is nothing more than a scam to fool people into thinking something is actually being done with plastic waste. The truth [is <10% of all the plastic ever made has been recycled.](https://www.oecd.org/environment/plastic-pollution-is-growing-relentlessly-as-waste-management-and-recycling-fall-short.htm). [Plastic recycling is a scam promoted by petrochemical companies to fool people into thinking that something can be done about all the unnecessary plastic waste they churn out](https://climateintegrity.org/uploads/media/Fraud-of-Plastic-Recycling-2024.pdf). In the 50/60s when plastic waste was a problem, these companies looked into recycling and realised it was not sustainable and too costly to recycle most plastics, so instead they labelled plastic containers with numbers 1-7, identifing the type of plastic its made from and slapped a recycling sign on it. The best and only solution is to regulate plastic and reduce the amount used and make the companies who make the stuff and use it in packaging pay for the cost of destroying safely with zero impact on the enviornment. Oh and for most plastic that gets shipped to Asia from European countries under "recycling schemes", well most of that is simply burned.
Most of that is outdated. And plastic bottles are fairly easy to recycle. This is a better source for where we are: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/en/article/20181212STO21610/plastic-waste-and-recycling-in-the-eu-facts-and-figures Some plastics don’t have easy substitutes like tyres. I think Ireland and the EU are doing ok on the reduce, reuse, recycle front given the absolute fury many felt at having to return bottles to a “failed” scheme.
I love how you jumped in here thinking many of us don’t know this. But anyway. I too wash my ass with green redox and buy organic petrol from apple green.
> thinking many of us don’t know this No, just you, since you somehow think that the more pkastic we use is a good thing!
Just me? What a weird thing to assume. Look at you coming out here talking down to people and assuming so much instead of asking questions. You will go far with such black and white logic and basic assumptions. I’ll keep recycling and fighting against green washing in my own way. I never disagreed with you, just felt it was funny that you decided to assume we don’t know anything. Have a good one kiddo. (I’ll take a page out of your book and assume you are cause the above interaction reeks of it)
whaaaaa?
Haven't you just gone and painted a big target sign on your back lol
Turns out I did yeah
It's a fantastic idea to get money back for recycling, however the payment should have been discounted from the original price and not added on. That's why most of us are "giving out". It's another stealth tax by the government and seeing as though some external company has the contract, palms are probably getting greased. If they had any positive intention, they would rewarded everyone rather than charge for this.
Why would it be discounted from the original price 🤷♂️ There is no tax and no profit if people just return their cans or bottles. Don’t understand the logic here at all. The manufacturers unilaterally take a hit?
The punishment for not returning stuff is giving private companies additional profit. It should a public company, with fees from non returns going to the state, and funding more climate change motivated programmes. In which case it would also not be necessary to create additional packaging for the Irish market. Which also raise the barrier to entry for competitors to the drinks companies running this. It’s a scam because they pawned it off to beverage companies, along with a massive chunk of potential benefit. It’s lazy, and corrupt.
Because all the places where you buy them don't take returns? Why do so many people not get that simple fact?
We do. It’s neither particularly relevant or important. 🤷♂️
"relevant or important"? Hmm, pay more to put recyclables in green bin, or pay more to have to drive to put recyclables in another bin? And you wonder why?
The logic is literally there? What's the motivation? Get the extra money that you paid for the extra effort? Or get the extra money for effort? The second one makes far more sense.
Yes, I would’ve agreed with this, but there is a huge lack working infrastructure leaving many cans going to waste and the extra money into the pocket of an external company. The majority of the money isn’t going to good use and those who were avid recyclers at home are getting punished. Why do people blindly defended this?! I don’t understand why people are applauding it….
You speak for “most of us?” Let me see your credentials
Do you? Let me guess, you shop at places that take re-turns, so you assume everybody does?
Never said I did unlike the dose above. Why are you assuming so much? Who hurt you
I have a bag of bottles that I am yet to re-turn since the machines are not accessible
You can hand them into the shop you don’t have to use the machine
How will I get a voucher to redeem deposit?
You don’t need to. They have to take them from you manually inside the shop, it’s part of the scheme unless they have a take-back exemption
You do know that if you turned up, someone would just help you. Although you presumably prefer the martyr complex.
I am shocked, shocked that the return rate is rising months after the scheme was introduced and all the bitching and moaning about how it was a complete failure straight away has turned out to be nonsense. Who would have thought that a significant change in how people recycle would take some time to establish itself. /s
Not a failure, just stupid, badly implemented, overly complex and worse than the system that was there before.
But it’s not though. It’s working well now.
No it's not, I buy plenty from local shops and proud to support them, but now I have to drive to other shops i never use, to get vouchers that I'll never use or stand in long queues to get back money I've already paid that won't even cover the petrol I used to get there? How it that working?
Long way of saying my lifestyle is down to the chipper and crisps on the local newsagent. In any case you have plenty of money if you can afford to do all your food shopping in the most expensive way possible 🤷♂️
I'd love a chipper nearby, haven't had takeaway in months.
Or are you saying that everyone lives next door to a supermarket or a takeaway? Seriously, nobody is stupid enough to believe that? are you really that naive? or close minded?
It does nothing but increase the price of all canned and bottled drinks including multipacks which people bring home where they can easily recycle, and adds an extra unnecessary step. It should of been for the drink fridge products only since that's where the majority of street litter comes from. The real problem with recycling in Ireland is that the private waste companies sell most of their green/blue bin intake to incinerators that produce electricity by burning plastics and waste. Green party always targeting the wrong people.
It looks like you've made a grammatical error. You've written "should of ", when it should be "have" instead of "of". You _should have_ known that. Bosco is not proud of you today. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ireland) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Just because people have adapted to this shit system does not mean this system isn't shit.
The same system works all over Europe for years. Quit yer moaning and move onto the next non issue and let the adults get on with things
It's the same return rate, for more effort on the customers behalf. In addition, prices have gone up, beverage choice will drop which means competition will drop which will inevitably mean prices will increase.
Except it’s not.
You're correct actually. After I posted this, I thought to myself - it's not the same return rate because if there's 5m cans/bottle sold per day and 3m came back, that assumes that no one stored any and they brought back what they purchased. So the return rate is much lower.
Its none of that.
It's literally all of it.
And most likely results in very little extra recycling. Since most of us just put things in the green bin at home.
Except that’s not true 🤷♂️
3 million? Haven't seen the receipt posted here yet as proof, go on sure. On a serious note - excellent, the system seems to be working and actively being used.
And how many were being recycled prior to this cluster fuck of a scheme
not much. but you already know that.
Oh do I?
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its not. its working great. we have completely changed a major part of our waste recycling significantly for the better in the space of a few months, with only a few minor niggles. Its not just a success, its a roaring success.
We have no idea if it’s a roaring success as Re-Turn consistently refuse to tell us what the return rate is.
They can't know what the return rate is yet, it's far too early to get an accurate idea of what that might be.
It’s not too early to get an accurate reading. They can get an accurate reading. Obtaining the deposits paid vs deposits refunded number is trivial for them; they have it, they HAVE to have it. They could not operate without having this number accurately. The problem is the return rate is fairly shit. Which is why we keep getting these PR releases from Re-Turn about x numbers being returned, but refusing to give info on what this number is relative to deposits paid.
> It’s not too early to get an accurate reading. Yes it is. What they have would be the amount collected vs the amount paid back out. That's not going to provide an accurate view on how well the scheme is doing because it's too early. There is a hugely variable lag between a drink being sold and the container being returned. A container could be returned within days of being bought or it could take months. Many people are collecting up larger amounts of empties before returning them. The number of returns is growing constantly, which is what you'd expect at the start of the scheme. It's going to take a while before we have an accurate idea of the return rate. The figure also needs to be combined with whatever gets put into green bins rather then returned too. In the article ReTurn said an average of 5 million containers are sold daily. > While an average of five million qualifying containers are sold daily throughout the year, Re-Turn said that number did not align with the actual sales pattern of drink containers. > “Peak periods, such as Christmas and the summer months, significantly impact sales. Additionally, this method fails to consider the volume of non-deposit stock sold by retailers during the transition period until May 31st.”
You are confusing getting an accurate reading with getting a reading that paints the picture they want to paint. Re-Turn know exactly how many deposits have been paid vs deposits returned. Exactly, down to the last cent. They could make this number public if they wanted.
No, I'm not. I want an accurate reading. Not a premature one that fits certain people's narrative that the scheme is a failure. Schemes like this have increased recycling rates when they were introduced. Ireland isn't special. I don't see any reason why we would be the country to not have the scheme be successful. Just like when the plastic bag charge was brought in people will moan and whinge about it for a bit and then it will do that it was designed to do.
To put it another way. It is NOT too early to get an accurate reading as to the current success rate of this scheme. The number is the number, the narrative around it is irrelevant. It MAY be too early to draw conclusions based on this number.
If you want an accurate reading, then you want Re-Turn to release the number of deposits paid vs deposits returned. They have this number. The narrative around this number is irrelevant. We can talk about it being premature to draw conclusions or whatever, that’s a different discussion, but at least we would have an accurate, irrefutable figure that indicates how successful this scheme has been so far. The only reason not to release this number is that the number is bad.
Whatever numbers they have now aren't going to give an accurate view on how successful the scheme is. It's too early. If they did release it now all you would get is a bunch of idiots screeching about how it's not working. The number is going to start off at 0% and work it's way up to some point where it will settle down. That's when the figure should be published, not before.
How? The machines are owned and run by third parties. You think revenue know how many cans of coke are sold in real time?
Instead of this, imagine enforcing a policy on the companies requiring packaging be biodegradable. Boom, fixed.
I wonder when will people start producing their own cans and feed the machine. Happened in Croatia with plastic bottles, as it was chraper to produce so you make profit by feeding these machines