Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications Eamon Ryan has confirmed that funds gathered under the new deposit return scheme (DRS) that are not reclaimed by the purchaser will be retained by Re-turn, the DRS operator.
Minister Ryan said the under the scheme that was established to meet “ambitious” EU targets under the Single Use Plastics Directive, “it is unlikely that every container for which a deposit has been paid will be returned by the purchaser.”
In those circumstances “deposits which are not refunded are referred to as unredeemed deposits, and the money which would be passed back to the purchaser will “be put back into the Scheme and used to fund the operations of the DRS.”
The Minister went to say that the Single Use Plastics Directive sets a 90% recycling target by 2029, with an interim target of 77% by 2025 and that he “fully expect those targets will be achieved or exceeded.”
He was responding to a parliamentary question from Fine Gael TD John Paul Phelan.
The deposit return scheme has been beset by criticism from both consumers and businesses since it came into effect.
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