Bottles and Cans

A deposit is claimed for all soda and beverage containers, i.e. aluminum cans, glass- and PET bottles carry a recycling deposit. It means that for each can/bottle produced, the producer has to pay 16 IKR into the Icelandic Recycling Fund. The producer claims this money back, of course, by including it in the price of the product. The Icelandic Recycling Fund then pays back 16 IKR to the person that returns the item for recycling. The deposit is an encouragement to return the item back into the material flow so the material can be reused instead of becoming garbage. Garbage has to become landfill or disposed in another polluting and expensive way, therefore there is a real savings involved in recycling, in addition to (the deposit system) creating less stress on the environment. You can collect, return and get your deposit back at the Recycling Depot (Endurvinnslan hf) that takes care of the process as a whole. Rescue corps and charities also accept for deposit packaging and they sell it as means of obtaining some cash.

A recycling fee is only paid for “deposit beverage containers“. They include: products with liquids ready to be consumed, except for milk containers, as such containers are often composite containers and therefore they are either not recyclable or difficult to recycle.

Aluminum cans, plastic and glass bottles shall be classified and counted according to type. A maximum of 1000 units are accepted each time at the recycle stations. New aluminum cans are produced from recycled ones. From old PET bottles polyester wool is produced, a material that can be used in the clothing industry, and in carpet manufacturing. Fleece clothes are the best known from this product. Glass bottles are ground down and used as filling material in landfills in Iceland.