Wellington is home to one of the state’s first reverse vending machine kiosks as part of the NSW Return and Earn container deposit scheme rollout.
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The kiosk was installed at the Woolworths supermarket in Wellington ahead of the scheme’s commencement on December 1.
Environment Protection Authority (EPA) Chair and CEO, Barry Buffier, said Return and Earn will have a significant environmental impact, and will be easy and convenient for the community to use.
“Return and Earn will make a major contribution to helping us achieve the Premier’s Priority of reducing litter volume by 40 per cent by 2020,” Mr Buffier said.
“It will also provide people with a financial incentive to do the right thing and recycle, to significantly reduce the estimated 160 million drink containers littered every year.”
People who return eligible drink containers will be able to donate their 10-cent per container refund directly to selected charities or transfer it to their designated account.
Alternately, they can redeem the refund for cash from Woolworths or use a credit voucher towards their shopping at Woolworths across NSW.
The reverse vending machines will make up part of the state’s collection network which will include hundreds of collection points.
Drink containers eligible for the 10-cent refund include most containers between 150ml and three litres.
Containers should not be crushed or broken and should have the original label attached when donated in order to be eligible for the refund.
