Webinar Replay: Rethinking How We Recycle

On Thursday, August 17, ConservAmerica hosted a webinar on recycling. Titled Rethinking How We Recycle: Bottle Bills and Beyond, the webinar featured expert panelists Philip Rossetti, Resident Senior Fellow at R Street, and Scott Breen, Vice President of Sustainability at the Can Manufacturers Institute.

We also heard from Hannah Flygare, who recently authored a report about renewable energy and battery waste management in the U.S. The webinar was moderated by ConservAmerica President Jeff Kupfer.

Recycling has always seemed like the easy, intuitive way for each of us to do our part, but the system may not be as easy, or as straightforward, as it seems. Consumers are faced with confusing and conflicting information on the daily about what can and can’t be recycled, how to properly recycle, and quite frankly, where most of their waste is actually going.

Americans buy billions of plastic and glass bottles and aluminum and steel cans each year, however, according to the Container Recycling Institute, two-thirds of all beverage containers never get recycled, instead ending up in landfills. Are bottle bills the answer?

Last year, ConservAmerica joined a coalition of supporters in favor of Recycling Refund programs. Recycling refunds, also known as beverage container redemption programs, deposit return systems, and “bottle bills,” are programs that place a fully refundable deposit on beverage containers. Can creating an economic incentive, and harnessing the power of the free market, improve sustainable behaviors?

To watch the webinar replay, click the screen below.