A study is suggesting Ontarians would like to see the province revisit a deposit return recycling program for non-alcoholic beverages and juice containers that stalled last summer.
The new poll from Abacus Data shows support is up five per cent year over year to 81 per cent in favour for some sort of system to manage empties.
Ontario was on course last summer with the “Recycle Everywhere” initiative before the Canadian Beverage Container Recycling Association (CBCRA), the agency that had oversight, shelved it citing a need for government policy changes.
“CBCRA has determined there is no viability to continue with the launch of Recycle Everywhere while the Ontario government adjusts the parameters for beverage container producer responsibility and explores a deposit return system for the recovery of non-alcoholic beverage containers,” said CBCRA head Ken Friesen.
Ashley Wallace, an associate director with Environmental Defense, says the survey results may suggest now is the time to follow up on the deposit return program amid reports the Ford government might put blue box costs on retailers and goods producers.
“Ontario actually has the lowest recycling rate for beverage containers in the country and that’s definitely because we don’t have a deposit system, which incentivizes the proper return of the containers,” Wallace explained.
Ontario and Manitoba are the only two provinces in Canada that don’t have a deposit return system for non-alcoholic beverage containers.
Wallace says return rates for beverage containers in the other provinces ranges between 75 to 90 per cent with Ontario seeing half as much, just over 43 per cent.
“Even our own alcoholic beverage container recycling program … that’s able to achieve closer to an 80 per cent recycling rate,” she said.
“So really, just deposit systems we know are the best practice.”
Environmental defense estimates some 1.7 billion drink bottles likely ended up in landfills, incinerators, and the ecosystem last year without a program.
Drink recycling currently falls within the purview of the province’s Blue Box regulations, which puts most of the costs to recycle on manufacturers.
However, Ministry of the Environment spokesperson Gary Wheeler says taxpayers were still on the hook for a couple hundred million dollars last year to operate the program.
“Last year residents spent over $168M to cover costs for large corporations who produce the waste and should be paying for,” Wheeler said in a statement.
More than half of poll respondents, 55 per cent, also wanted the convenience of returning containers to the same merchant they purchased from, like grocery and convenience stores.
Reverse vending machines are prominent in several European nations, offering the insertion of an empty bottle or aluminum can in exchange for a reward.
However, Wallis says that model could be a hard sell since many stores are not likely to give up that kind of space since they are not manufacturers.
“Unfortunately, we are seeing pushback right now from the grocery stores and from retailers who don’t want to give up, their footprint in their store for this kind of technology, especially because not all of them actually manufacture the containers,” said Wallis.