I saw on videos from Germany and Denmark that low income people are making money from containers abandoned in the streets by the well off.
This keeps been rolled out by the cheer leaders as a positive.
I personally think it is beyond crass.
……
How to avoid scams.
https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/consumer/buying-digital-content-and-services/scams-and-fraud/
I'll say it again we aren't the Germans so you can't compare us to them.
Ossian Smyth missed a trick there.
He could be promoting this scam as a nice day out for bored couples.
Bottom first - I think we've just stumbled across the perfect slogan for this scheme
The idea is to see if adding deposits to containers will get our previously good recycling rate even higher. As per the target as part of our EU membership. The machines are going in Germany since 2003, and they are up in the very high 90's percent range. Give ours a chance, and do not condemn them within a couple of months. I saw on videos from Germany and Denmark that low income people are making money from containers abandoned in the streets by the well off.
I'll snap a few photo's next week of the reverse vending machine set-up's in Lithuania. I've been using the system there for years, hence my enthusiasm for it when I heard it was finally coming to Ireland…. (how wrong I was).
The ones I've used over there, the RVM is located in a separate room attached to the shop, but with a door to the outside only, so you don't have to go into the shop at all (and accessible 24 hours per day). Also their RVM's take in glass bottles in addition to plastic bottles & cans.
I've never once had a bottle/can rejected from the machines there, and I've never one arrived at a machine that was out of order.
As an anti litter scheme, it's fine in theory. Implemented poorly with vested interests having too much influence.
As a recycling scheme, it's a complete pain in the arse. We have a system of recycle bins for many years now that we pay for and which the majority of householders use. Pissing off compliant citizens is not the way to go. That this is not integrated into the scheme is scandalous and Minister Smyth should be fired for gross incompetence.
I don't see how a smoking ban in a pub is in any way remotely similar to the DRS.
Baffles me that some people are comparing the implementation of both.
Walked past Dealz again today their out of order notice is getting a bit ragged at the edges.
I like watching the videos from other countries. Happy people make me happy.
You've left out a couple of steps there. Pay a deposit. Store the bottle/can. Travel to a machine in the hope it is working. Queue to use it. Get a voucher from a machine. Queue at a customer service till to get the deposit back or use it against future consumption.
How it should work is that if I buy a bottle of water at a shop at the top of O'Connell St and drink it whilst walking along O'Connell St is that I should be able to pop into a shop at the bottom of O'Connell St and get rid of the bottle and reclaim deposit.
Any retail outlet that sells bottles/cans should be obliged to take them back.
Re-turn told the guy in the article that in order to reclaim his deposit he would have to bring the bottle on holidays with him and bring it back undamaged. Ridiculous.
@odyssey06 WELL SAID!!!!!
It should be that simple. But of course in Ireland we have to screw it up with machines that don't work, with machines that aren't wheelchair friendly, with no consideration given to people who get deliveries, or live in areas without RVMs.
So why did Ireland have to be different to the rest? Why is our exemption from manual returns so large compared to elsewhere?
Why don't Irish retailers have to take back returns manually if the machines are out of order? So why did Ireland have to be different to others on that?
Why are there no bulk RVMs at Council refuse locations? Why are there no public RVMs run by any state body to serve locations without RVMs? So why did Ireland have to be different to others on that?
Why was the rollout such a shambles with confusion over logo, over deposits being charged for non refundable items? What is the point of the logo, except to screw over smaller companies, if all that matters is the barcode?
We've just given a dog's dinner of a scheme by vested interests here who want to wash their hands of responsibility and put all the hassle onto the consumer. And then we get patronising lectures from incompetent weasels like Ossian Smyth and the laughing jackasses running Re-turn and lying about it to the public. Doesn't matter to him, they can treat the public with contempt over the scheme, they still pickup their pay check for their invented job.
There seems to be differences in the machines rolled out, some may seperate them, some may not. I've seen videos of Re-turn plastic bins where both cans and plastic bottles were in a single bin, this was then collected by a Re-turn truck where the lot was tossed in the back, it didn't appear to have any option to segregate the plastic and cans even if they were previously separated so the whole seperation process is pointless.
The machines aren't working.
Maybe we should go back to the old way, where you bring back your bottle and get a coin deposit back from the cashier? That makes more sense to me.
This scheme is a load of old bollocks. But somebody is making out like a bandit somewhere.
Scheme/scam
But it's not really savings because you're only getting the money back that you already paid. It's not extra money.
So how are you putting it on a gift card? I was under the impression you can only get a cash refund or a deduction off your shopping with the receipt.
Once I deposit mine (and other peoples who can't be bothered or no transport) I bring the receipt to the supermarket and the put it on a gift card. It's adding up very quickly, it's like a little savings club 😜
The "machines" haven't worked.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/723191/production-of-polyethylene-terephthalate-bottles-worldwide/#:~:text=This%20statistic%20depicts%20the%20production,plastic%20bottles%20will%20be%20produced.
The point I (and others) are making, is that there was a "simpler" scheme in place prior to this. Recycle bin at house, put all recycleables in that bin. Much better overall system for the environment, much "better" and easier for the consumer and a hell of a lot less faffing around/variables at play, not perfect but a damn sight "better" than this new one. The bin companies even used it as a revenue stream.
The people who used this system did so well. Only major problem with this system that I can see, versus the new one, was that it was not "easy" to count returns versus what was sold. The people who "used" this scheme are generally gonna use the DRS unless it doesn't suit them and they will go back to using their recycle bin or some even the regular bin (I don't get why you would do that but anyway)
You had people who didn't engage for whatever reason or used the wrong bins etc. Those people, as far as I can see, aren't engaging with this new scheme and wont.
You also had the people who were "on the go" or in office buildings who may have taken their recycleables home with them and put in the recycle bin at home but you'll find that a lot of these people will just fling the items into the nearest bin whereever that is.
You are looking on this at way to close in a level. If you want to make our "collection" rates of PET and Alumium cans, you need to looks more closely at the barriers to doing that - we very obviously know that the people I talk about above and the environmental situations they find themselves in are the main barriers - how to you accomodate them - how do you ensure producers aren't let off the hook - what alternatives are there to PET etc etc?
Machines have been working around the world since the 1970's. No going back.
there was also an alcohol ban in america in the 1930s, not every do-gooder policey was sucessful or an obvious right move in hindsight. many have righty been overturned when common sense prevailed
Just me and you.
Thats where you are wrong. We are.
It is simple enough. Pay a deposit, get it back from a machine. I can't see a way to tweak that. We are not some strange race in Ireland that has to be different than the rest.
It won't wont get to 90 percent collection rate without significant tweaking - that much is obvious to me at least.
It won't get to 90 percent recycling rate without much more significant tweaking of the entire supply chain.
As we have seen in many countries with this scheme in place for over a decade the useage of PET's hasn't decreased as a result of these schemes, the opposite infact as the incentive hasn't been there - same will happen here - and again - thats not really in any ones interests from an environmental PoV.
This is not comparable to smoking rate reduction for any one of ten different reasons - see previous point.
They certainly save money on the self service checkouts.
But staffing levels have been adjusted accordingly so that money is already banked.
If every shop that has an RVM was ordered to house and staff a manual system as well I reckon there would be push back from the retailers.
It will probably be something which achieves its objective over the next few decades. Like the developed world got smoking rates down gradually since the 1950's. It is far too soon to pronounce on it after just a few months. There won't be a word about it this time next year. And if stats come out to show a bit of an uptick in recycling, they will be generally ignored.
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