Bottled Water Deposits in Connecticut

A Connecticut radio station recently stated that the bottle bill which has people pay a five cent deposit on carbonated beverages will start including bottled water, and they expect it will generate 17 million dollars in state revenue for unredeemed bottles next year.

With a population of about 3.5 million and figuring five cents per bottle, that would mean that the average person is expected to throw away 97 empty water bottles away unredeemed per year. Ninety-seven in just one year! Eight in just a month.

Some people don't drink bottled water at all. Some who do might be prone to redeem every bottle they purchase. That means that the people who are just throwing them away are throwing away even more than the above projected figures per person.

If these are bottles are simply being thrown out and not recycled, what a pity, as I'm sure all this plastic is awful for the environment.

I wonder why people don't just voluntarily recycle? My only hope is that more items that are normally discarded do get picked up by others and recycled. I wonder why the state drums projects like this up, forcing consumers who do recycle to do this in a less efficient manner? If funds are needed for a State budget, there are two ways to look at it. One is that more money is needed. Another is that they are overspending.