Cadaqués trials “pioneering” recycling scheme

Artists’ favourite Cadaqués is trialling a recycling scheme that sees a 5 cent refund on the return of packaging for certain beverage products.

For some reason the pilot project is described as “pioneering”, but surely it is simply a return to how things used to be. I remember as a kid in the UK collecting discarded lemonade and other bottles to return to supermarkets to collect the huge bounty of 2p, and a similar scheme was in place in Spain too.

At some stage it became too inconvenient to actually return bottles and reuse them, instead collecting them in bottle banks and recycling the glass. How was that ever a better solution given the energy requirements of meeting down that glass to turn into new objects?

I hope the Cadaqués scheme is successful and the idea spreads, as it is something I’ve discussed on numerous occasions. The scheme, however, uses vending machines to return plastic bottles; why not simplify and just set up a manual system as well as extend the scheme to glass?

Source: La Vanguardia

Tags: Cadaques, socialmedia, Society