Why we expect a deposit on bottles and also on cans from the Minister for the Environment

In her Letter to Parliament of 10 March 2018, State Secretary for Infrastructure and Water Management Stientje van Veldhoven (D66) gave the companies involved a final two-year chance to drastically reduce pollution from plastic bottles: “First of all, I have reached agreement on a recycling target for small plastic bottles of 90% and a reduction target for small plastic bottles in litter of 70-90% (…) In addition, I have agreed with the packaging industry to prepare the introduction of deposit return schemes on small plastic bottles in case it appears in autumn 2020 that these targets have not been achieved”.

In the Letter to Parliament of 27 September 2019, the State Secretary announced that she has decided “to bring forward the decision-making moment on the introduction of deposit return schemes to spring 2020 at the latest. Based on the then available measurements of litter and the report on the 90% recycling target, I will make a decision. (…) The measurements [of the number of bottles in litter] over the second half of 2019 will be decisive for this. Postponing the introduction is not an option for me”. The House of Representatives will receive “the measurements over the second half of 2019 in February 2020”.

Stientje van Veldhoven was State Secretary for Infrastructure and Water Management from 2017 to 2019. Since 1 November 2019, she has been Minister for the Environment and Housing.

Monitoring of plastic bottles in litter

These measurements will then be the fourth monitoring result of the numbers of plastic bottles and cans in litter. The monitoring was set up in 2018.

The previous monitoring results showed that the business community is nowhere near achieving the reduction target of 70% fewer plastic bottles in litter.

Looking at these three previous monitoring results, Van Veldhoven writes in the Letter to Parliament of 27 September 2019: “In the administrative consultations, it was established that the number of small plastic bottles in litter shows an upward rather than a downward trend, and that a considerable distance remains to the intended goal”.

Since previous measurements established an increase in the number of bottles in litter, it is unlikely that the final monitoring result in February will show that the 70% reduction could now suddenly be achieved.

Because the Minister for the Environment has written that these monitoring results over the second half of 2019 will be decisive, we expect that when these monitoring results are released in February, she will immediately decide that deposit return schemes on plastic bottles will become a reality by spring 2021 at the latest.

The legislation is ready. Moreover, the business community benefits from a quick decision: the industry has indicated that it needs a year to implement a deposit system, and it has been agreed that this must be in operation by spring 2021 at the latest. The Minister for the Environment has previously communicated that this is a hard deadline.

Cans in litter

The decision of the Minister for the Environment to only provide deposit return schemes for plastic bottles and not for cans met with little understanding from the opposition from the very beginning. There are indeed major problems with cans in litter.

Bottles and cans together account for about 40 percent of all litter (by volume). Cans make up 62.7 percent of the number of beverage containers in litter. The share of cans in litter is therefore larger than the number of bottles. Research into the Costs and volume of litter by KplusV showed that around 100 million to 150 million cans end up in litter every year.

If the cans end up in cattle feed during mowing, this leads to illness and sometimes death in cattle. It was recently demonstrated that there is plastic in cans, which is released into nature after the can weathers.

According to the Report on litter cost research Netherlands by Deloitte, total litter costs are 250 million euros. Municipalities and other area managers (primarily public authorities) together pay 239 million euros of this, or 95.6 percent.

These costs can be reduced by introducing deposit return schemes on bottles and cans. The deposit study by CE Delft commissioned by the Dutch government calculated that 80 million euros per year could be saved by introducing deposit return schemes on both bottles and cans. This partly explains why 95 percent of all Dutch municipalities, all 12 provinces and 21 water boards call on the Dutch government to introduce deposit return schemes on both bottles and cans.

Deposit return schemes on bottles and cans will also prevent shifts from disposable bottles to disposable cans within the market. For beverage producers, it is also important to get clarity on developments and to create a level playing field.

Increasing political support for

In her Letter to Parliament of 10 March 2018, State Secretary for Infrastructure and Water Management Stientje van Veldhoven (D66) gave the companies involved a final two-year chance to drastically reduce pollution from plastic bottles: “First of all, I have reached agreement on a recycling target for small plastic bottles of 90% and a reduction target for small plastic bottles in litter of 70-90% (…) In addition, I have agreed with the packaging industry to prepare the introduction of deposit return schemes on small plastic bottles in case it appears in autumn 2020 that these targets have not been achieved”.

In the Letter to Parliament of 27 September 2019, the State Secretary announced that she has decided “to bring forward the decision-making moment on the introduction of deposit return schemes to spring 2020 at the latest. Based on the then available measurements of litter and the report on the 90% recycling target, I will make a decision. (…) The measurements [of the number of bottles in litter] over the second half of 2019 will be decisive for this. Postponing the introduction is not an option for me”. The House of Representatives will receive “the measurements over the second half of 2019 in February 2020”.

Stientje van Veldhoven was State Secretary for Infrastructure and Water Management from 2017 to 2019. Since 1 November 2019, she has been Minister for the Environment and Housing.

Monitoring of plastic bottles in litter

These measurements will then be the fourth monitoring result of the numbers of plastic bottles and cans in litter. The monitoring was set up in 2018.

The previous monitoring results showed that the business community is nowhere near achieving the reduction target of 70% fewer plastic bottles in litter.

Looking at these three previous monitoring results, Van Veldhoven writes in the Letter to Parliament of 27 September 2019: “In the administrative consultations, it was established that the number of small plastic bottles in litter shows an upward rather than a downward trend, and that a considerable distance remains to the intended goal”.

Since previous measurements established an increase in the number of bottles in litter, it is unlikely that the final monitoring result in February will show that the 70% reduction could now suddenly be achieved.

Because the Minister for the Environment has written that these monitoring results over the second half of 2019 will be decisive, we expect that when these monitoring results are released in February, she will immediately decide that deposit return schemes on plastic bottles will become a reality by spring 2021 at the latest.

The legislation is ready. Moreover, the business community benefits from a quick decision: the industry has indicated that it needs a year to implement a deposit system, and it has been agreed that this must be in operation by spring 2021 at the latest. The Minister for the Environment has previously communicated that this is a hard deadline.

Cans in litter

The decision of the Minister for the Environment to only provide deposit return schemes for plastic bottles and not for cans met with little understanding from the opposition from the very beginning. There are indeed major problems with cans in litter.

Bottles and cans together account for about 40 percent of all litter (by volume). Cans make up 62.7 percent of the number of beverage containers in litter. The share of cans in litter is therefore larger than the number of bottles. Research into the Costs and volume of litter by KplusV showed that around 100 million to 150 million cans end up in litter every year.

If the cans end up in cattle feed during mowing, this leads to illness and sometimes death in cattle. It was recently demonstrated that there is plastic in cans, which is released into nature after the can weathers.

According to the Report on litter cost research Netherlands by Deloitte, total litter costs are 250 million euros. Municipalities and other area managers (primarily public authorities) together pay 239 million euros of this, or 95.6 percent.

These costs can be reduced by introducing deposit return schemes on bottles and cans. The deposit study by CE Delft commissioned by the Dutch government calculated that 80 million euros per year could be saved by introducing deposit return schemes on both bottles and cans. This partly explains why 95 percent of all Dutch municipalities, all 12 provinces and 21 water boards call on the Dutch government to introduce deposit return schemes on both bottles and cans.

Deposit return schemes on bottles and cans will also prevent shifts from disposable bottles to disposable cans within the market. For beverage producers, it is also important to get clarity on developments and to create a level playing field.

Increasing political support for deposit on cans

Even after Stientje van Veldhoven had communicated that cans were not included in the deposit decision, several politicians have repeatedly campaigned for cans in litter to be tackled anyway.

This led to the House of Representatives voting unanimously in April 2018 in favour of the motion by MP Carla Dik-Faber (ChristenUnie). That motion asks the government to make agreements with the business community and municipalities on an action plan with a reduction percentage for cans in litter in 2020.

A year and a half after Dik-Faber's motion, Rijkswaterstaat notes in the monitoring report on the first half of 2019 that “on average, the number of cans in 2019 is equal to the average number of cans during the measurements in 2016 and 2017.”

In the Letter to Parliament of 27 September 2019 accompanying these monitoring results over the first half of 2019, State Secretary Van Veldhoven writes: “Unfortunately, VNG and the packaging industry (…) have indicated that they do not wish to draw up a separate approach for cans. However, the measurements from RWS show that the current focus on cans via the broad approach does not bring about a downward trend of cans in litter. I find this a worrying development in view of the widely shared desire to reduce cans in litter”.

Meanwhile, the political will to tackle cans in litter with a deposit system is growing more and more. On 10 October 2019, an article appeared in the daily newspaper Trouw in which government parties D66, CDA and ChristenUnie spoke out as supporters of deposits on cans. MP Jessica van Eijs (D66) declared: “The problem has only proved to be bigger recently. Patience has run out a bit.” Carla Dik-Faber (CU): “We are giving the industry one last chance to get this sorted themselves. But there is one system that really works, and that is a deposit return scheme.” Maurits von Martels (CDA): “This subject was non-negotiable within my party for a long time, but times have changed.” Von Martels, himself a dairy farmer, is concerned, among other things, about cows getting small pieces of metal or aluminium into their stomachs, sometimes with fatal consequences.

In her response, State Secretary Van Veldhoven declared on 11 October to Hart van Nederland that she sees “that the House is offering more space now and that a deposit on cans is now really on the table as a viable option. I think that is good, because we all just want to achieve that goal of a clean environment.”

On 17 October 2019, the House of Representatives adopted two motions regarding cans in litter and the introduction of deposits on cans.

The motion by Paternotte et al. (no. 33) “requests the government to set comparable targets for cans (as in beverage containers) for autumn 2021”, referring here to the 90% separate collection of plastic bottles as set out in law and the 70-90% reduction target of plastic bottles in litter.

The motion by Dik-Faber et al. (no. 39) “requests the government to initiate the same process for cans as was done for small plastic bottles, including preparing legal measures for the introduction of a deposit scheme by 2022 and to periodically inform the House of progress.”

Deciding on deposits on cans in this governing period

As an environmental organisation, we support the motions by Paternotte et al. and Dik-Faber et al. These motions offer good starting points for introducing deposit return schemes on beverage cans.

It seems correct to us to formulate the same targets for autumn 2021 as were previously set for plastic bottles, namely 70-90% fewer cans in litter in terms of numbers and 90% separate collection of them (Paternotte motion). In addition, it is possible and desirable to prepare the legal measures and complete them by the end of 2020 at the latest, so that deposits on cans can be introduced in 2022 (Dik-Faber motion).

Furthermore, these motions offer the space to set up a process whereby a decision to introduce deposits on cans falls within this governing period. This is possible if the Minister for the Environment decides to schedule an interim evaluation in the first two months of 2021 based on the measurement results over 2020 and links a decision-making moment to this.

At that moment, compared to the unanimously adopted motion by Dik-Faber et al. of April 2018, which requests an action plan and reduction percentage for cans in litter in 2020, more than two and a half years will have passed.

The government already has reliable and comprehensive monitoring results regarding cans in litter in the years 2018 and 2019, because Rijkswaterstaat included them in its monitoring of plastic bottles. The balance can be stock-taken in early 2021 to see whether the target of 70-90% fewer cans can be achieved by the end of 2021.

That it is possible to determine on the basis of earlier monitoring results whether the targets will be achieved later that same year was proved by the minister in October by bringing forward the decision on deposit return schemes on plastic bottles.

Clarity for companies

The business community needs clarity in the short term to ensure that investments run as efficiently as possible. A phased introduction of deposit return schemes on plastic bottles (2021) and cans (2022) is very possible. However, the crux lies in the moment when the system is designed and investments are made. It will save the business community money and time if cans can be taken into account immediately when expanding to bottles. The Minister for the Environment can guide this process in the right direction by making a decision within this cabinet period.

Finally, a decision-making moment in January or February 2021 means that the business community has sufficient time to take the necessary measures so that deposit return schemes on cans can be in place in 2022. This is in line with the motions voted on by parliament.

No reason to wait

Current policy does not reduce the number of cans in the environment. The two parliamentary motions make it possible for the government to decide during this governing period.