PORTLAND, Ore. — In the nearly 50 years since Oregon’s Bottle Bill took effect, consumers have never paid a deposit for wine.
That could change under a measure approved by the Senate on Wednesday.
Senate Bill 1520 would add wine to the list of beverages that qualify for a ten-cent deposit—but only if it’s sold in a can.
“Once an oddity, wine packaged in cans is increasingly to be found on store shelves,” said Sen. Michael Dembrow, D-Portland. “Consumers assume that those cans carry deposits and can be redeemed.”
But they can’t. Since its inception, wine has always been excluded from the Bottle Bill, even as other alcoholic beverages, including Oregon’s beloved craft beer, were included.
The Oregon Beverage Recycling Cooperative says some larger wine bottles could be difficult to process using current beverage container recycling equipment. Dembrow said the idea of adding bottled wine to the Bottle Bill is still under discussion, but for now, it would be relatively simple, logistically speaking, to add canned wine.
The wine industry, as represented by three groups at the Capitol, was officially neutral on the bill, although it did successfully lobby for an 18-month delay in the effective date, from Jan. 1, 2024 to July 1, 2025.
While Oregon’s first-in-the-nation bottle deposit law went relatively unchanged for nearly 40 years after taking effect, lawmakers in recent years have made several changes.
Since 2009, several types of beverages have been added to the program, including bottled water, energy drinks, fruit juice, and kombucha. The deposit amount has also increased from the original five cents per container to the current ten cents. In addition to bottled wine, hard liquor and milk would remain among the beverages not included if the Senate Bill 1520 is signed into law.
The measure passed the Senate 23-4 and now heads to the House.
