About 90 new sites for people to recycle empty drink containers will be added to the Bay Area after several counties received grants from the state’s recycling and waste management agency, officials said this week.
The grants will fund some 250 new recycling sites across 30 California counties in total, officials said.
The director of CalRecycle, Zoe Heller, told the Bay Area News Group that the department had been hearing from Bay Area residents and people throughout the state that there was a need for more opportunities and sites for people to bring their beverage containers and redeem them for nickels and dimes.
Alameda, Sacramento and San Mateo counties will have three different disposal methods for recyclable beverage containers — mobile, bag drop and a reverse vending machine. The counties of Contra Costa, Santa Clara, San Francisco, Marin and Monterey received grants to implement reverse vending machines. Sonoma County will also be implementing bag drop and reverse vending machine systems.
A news release from CalRecycle announced that $70 million in Beverage Container Redemption Innovation Grants would be used to set up the sites in 30 counties across the state of California.
Heller said that a reverse vending machine works similarly to a traditional vending machine; people can put their bottles and cans in a slot and get cash for those recyclables.