Container Recycling Institute
1911 Ft. Myer Drive, Suite 900
Arlington, Virginia 22209
703/276-9800 fax 276-9587

July 2, 1997
For Immediate Release

Contact: Pat Franklin, 202/797-6839

Beverage Containers Maintain Position As Second Most Littered Item On America's Beaches

WASHINGTON, DC -- If you're headed for the beach this weekend, you can expect to encounter more cigarette butts and beverage containers than any other littered item. The results are in from the 1996 annual beach cleanup sponsored by the Center for Marine Conservation (CMC) and the 608,759 cigarette butts collected topped the list of seventy-five items collected. The data was compiled during fall's cleanup of 5,917 miles of U.S. shoreline.

But, according to the Container Recycling Institute (CRI), beverage containers are gaining ground in the battle for the most littered item on America's shorelines. "You might say that beverage containers are the AVIS of beach litter," said Pat Franklin, Executive Director of CRI. "The 380,213 beverage cans and bottles collected during CMC's annual beach cleanup put that item in second place, but, if cigarette butts continue to decline, we can expect beverage containers to overtake cigarette butts as the number one littered item by the year 2000."

According to CRI's analysis of CMC's data, cigarette butts declined 30 percent last year, while beverage containers dropped less than 4 percent. But, Franklin maintains that measuring litter by piece count is deceiving. "Measuring litter by volume provides a more accurate measurement of the real impact of litter," she said.

CRI did a comparison of beverage containers and cigarette butts by volume, and found that it would take 56 million cigarette butts to fill all the cans and bottles collected during CMC's beach cleanup. "They collected .6 million butts, but they would have needed another 55.4 million butts to fill the 380,213 beverage containers collected," said Franklin.

Franklin pointed out that over 140,667 pieces of glass were found, most of which were from broken beverage bottles. "That is the kind of litter," said Franklin, "that is not only unsightly, but dangerous."

"Cigarette butts are nasty thing to see lying on a beach, or anywhere else," said Franklin, "but let's face it, ten or twenty littered beer bottles or soda cans are a lot more unsightly and take up a lot more beach area than ten or twenty cigarette butts." More importantly," she said, "cigarette butts don't cut bare feet, broken bottles do."

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Container Recycling Institute
1911 Ft. Myer Drive, Suite 900
Arlington, Virginia 22209
703/276-9800 fa 276-9587

Contact: Pat Franklin
202/797-6839

For Immediate Release

July 16, 1997

Research Group Bursts Soft Drink Industry's Bubble, Soft Drink Container Recycling Rate Drops Again

WASHINGTON, DC (July 16, 1997) -- The Container Recycling Institute (CRI) today accused the soft drink industry of distorting the soda container recycling numbers released yesterday by their trade association. "We hate to burst the soft drink industry's bubble," said Pat Franklin, Executive Director of CRI, "but the numbers they released yesterday are flat out wrong."

In a press release issued yesterday, the National Soft Drink Association (NSDA) claimed that a record number of soda containers were recycled last year. But, according to CRI, the number of soda containers recycled in 1996 was exactly the same as 1995 -- 48.4 containers -- and the recycling rate for soda cans and bottles actually decreased.

"Whether the discrepancy was a manipulation of the numbers or simply an oversight, NSDA should issue an immediate retraction," said Franklin. "The public should know that soft drink container recycling is declining, and that the recycling rate has dropped for the third year in a row." Franklin attributes the drop in soft drink container recycling to the drop in PET soda bottle recycling, which fell more than 17 percent last year. "Because 1 out of 5 soft drink containers is a PET bottle, even a small discrepancy in the PET numbers skews the entire calculation," she said.

Franklin explained that the American Plastic Council (APC), this year, changed the way they calculate the recycling rate for PET bottles. They now use the number of pounds of bottles collected, whereas in the past they used the number of pounds of bottles processed. The new method was adopted by APC, because it is the method used by other industries.

"Using the old method for 1995 made it look like there was an increase in PET soda bottle recycling, when actually there was a decrease," said Franklin. "When you are measuring trends," she said, "you have to be consistent in your method of calculation, otherwise you end up comparing apples and oranges." Using the same method for both years, the number of soda containers recycled in 1995 was 48.4 billion soda containers--exactly the number recycled in 1996, and the recycling rate declined from 58.5 percent to 57.6 percent.

NSDA credits comprehensive recycling programs for the high soft drink container recycling rate. But, based on data in the same U.S. Environmental Protection Agency study referenced by NSDA, CRI estimates that soft drink and beer containers are recycled at an average rate of 78 percent in states where they have a deposit value, and only 26 percent in the other 40 states. "The credit for the relatively high levels of soft drink and beer container recycling is due to the high rates of recovery in the ten bottle bill states," said Franklin, "not curbside recycling programs."

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Container Recycling Institute
1911 Ft. Myer Drive, Suite 900
Arlington, Virginia 22209
703/276-9800 fax 276-9587

FOR RELEASE
April 11, 1997

CONTACT: Pat Franklin

Executive Director

$600 Million Worth Of Used Aluminum Beverage Cans Landfilled In 1996

Group calls on beer and soda companies to halt the wasting of energy and material resources by implementing voluntary deposit system

WASHINGTON, DC -- The Container Recycling Institute (CRI) estimates that the 36 billion aluminum cans landfilled last year had a scrap value of more than $600 million. "We are literally throwing money away when we don't reclaim valuable resources," said Pat Franklin, Executive Director of CRI. "Over the past twenty years we've trashed more than 11 million tons of aluminum beverage cans worth over $12 billion on today's market. Some day we'll be mining our landfills for the resources we've buried."

Franklin says it would cost approximately $2.5 billion to replace the aluminum cans that are discarded each year in the U.S. with new cans. "But," she said, "the hundreds of millions of pounds and hundreds of millions of dollars worth of aluminum cans landfilled last year are just part of a much bigger 'waste' picture," said Franklin. "Mining, obtaining energy for refining and the refining process itself have enormous environmental impact."

Senator Jim Jeffords, (R-VT) has introduced a bill aimed at encouraging recycling of aluminum cans and other materials. The bill would require a 10-cent deposit on all beverage containers in states where those containers have not achieved a 70 percent recycling rate. "As we've seen in my home state of Vermont, bottle bills are good for the environment and good for business," said Jeffords. "The National Beverage Container Reuse and Recycling Act of 1997 would increase recycling of aluminum cans and other containers, save energy, conserve resources, create jobs and decrease the generation of waste."

According to Franklin, the beer and soft drink industry could avoid a mandatory deposit system by implementing a voluntary deposit system and immediately boost the recycling rate for their aluminum, glass, and plastic containers above 85 percent.  CRI's research shows that while the national recycling rate for aluminum cans has never exceeded 65 percent, the average recycling rate for aluminum cans and other beverage containers is 85 percent or higher in eight states where these containers have a deposit value of a nickel or a dime. "The five or ten-cent incentive keeps bottles and cans off of streets and beaches and out of landfills in Michigan, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Oregon, Maine, Vermont and Iowa. Even in California where beverage cans have a 2.5 cent value, the recycling rate was 80 percent last year."

Critics of CRI's 'glass-half-empty' approach say CRI ignores the strides that have been made in recycling and in the lightweighting of aluminum cans. Franklin says she recognizes and applauds the aluminum can manufacturing industry's successful efforts at source reduction by reducing the weight of aluminum cans by 40 percent over the past twenty years. "While I don't doubt their commitment to the environment, it is a fact that can manufacturers realize huge energy savings by making new cans out of used cans. This cost savings is the primary motivation."

Franklin called on the end users of aluminum cans to offer solutions to the problem. "The can manufacturing industry says it is committed to recycling 'every can that is returned', said Franklin, but the infrastructure has to be there to collect the cans. "It's time for the end users, namely the beer and soft drink producers, to take responsibility for the collection and recycling of their containers. They could increase the recycling rate for aluminum cans and the rest of their containers above 85 percent if they instituted a voluntary deposit system."

"It should be obvious, by now, that we cannot rely on the curbside recycling infrastructure to boost recycling rates for aluminum cans, since a doubling of curbside programs over the past six years has had virtually no impact on the aluminum can recycling rate," Franklin said. "We're calling on the beer and soft drink companies to halt the wasting of energy and material resources from their one-way beverage containers by implementing a voluntary deposit system."