Why don’t wine bottles have CRV (California Refund Value)?

How did I not notice this before? Maybe because not until the last four years did I become an imbiber of wine? Either that or the morning after drinking I take all evidence out of the home and into the recycling bin, not wanting to assess the damage done (to my liver, that is).

According to the state Department of Conservation, alcoholic beverages subject to CRV include beer and malt beverages, wine coolers and distilled spirit coolers.

So why not include wine bottles? Mark Oldfield, a spokesman for the California Department of Conservation, said the decision on which bottles and cans are subject to the nickel-and-dime redemption law and which are not is “really a decision that happens not with the Department of Conservation, but with the Legislature.”

The CRV program began in 1987, and originally applied only to carbonated soft drinks and beer cans and bottles. Because of the explosion in the use of bottles for water, iced tea and sports drinks, this program has expanded over time to include these beverage containers, too.

Mark Murray, executive director of the advocacy group Californians Against Government Waste, said there is no good reason for excluding wine and liquor bottles. The reason they are not included, he said, “is entirely political, due to the influence of the larger corporate winemakers.”

Liquor manufacturers and those who make low-priced and fortified wines, he said, view it as a “competitive advantage” to not have the 5 or 10 cents added onto their products.

Murray said he doesn’t see lobbying opposition coming from the premium wine industry. “The smaller and family winemakers have either no objection or have been supportive” of adding wine bottles to the CRV program, he said.

Terry Hall, communications director of the Napa Valley Vintners, pointed out that winemakers and manufacturers of liquor already pay an excise tax, a manufacturing levy that is often placed on makers of alcohol and tobacco products. They can argue that they are already taxed in ways other beverage makers are not.Hall also pointed out that the recycling program was launched to get smaller-sized bottles —16 ounces and 12 ounces — off the streets and out of the gutters. This was, indeed, one of the CRV program’s intentions — to deter littering (and encourage recycling).

Gladys Horiuchi of the Wine Institute, a trade organization representing the California Wine Industry, said there is another reason wine bottles are outside the scope of the law. “California’s bottle redemption program was created to help prevent litter problems,” she wrote in an e-mail. “Since wine bottles are not considered part of the litter problem, they are not under the bottle redemption program. The wine industry supports litter prevention efforts by advocating for curbside recycling programs in rural neighborhoods and other areas that do not have these services.”

Meanwhile, the CRV program has been successful by any standard. In 2008, 16.1 billion CRV containers were recycled statewide, representing      74 percent of all 21.9 billion sold in California — that’s 1.5 billion more picked up than in 2007, according to Oldfield.

CRV paid to consumers when they recycle containers at recycling centers is 5¢ for each beverage container less than 24 ounces and 10¢ for each container 24 ounces or greater.

Bottoms up!

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