[berkeleybeej]

I hope the Berkeley recyclers are investigated.

BTW - supposedly this California recycling setup doesn't cost the taxpayer ANYTHING (ha). Consumers pay a deposit at the time of purchase that is supposed to go into the recycling payback fund. The only way it would cost taxpayers is if more containers are redeemed than were sold.

It would be interesting to see what percentage of containers sold in California are being redeemed?

[Rocksalt]

I see from the article these folks were cashing in the cans and bottles by weight.I'm sure the reason they were able to get away with this was because the loads came in in trucks and the bottles were not scruntinized closely.In my state aluminum cans are worth 5 cents,and they have to be counted and sorted to get any money out of them.Obviously the system of redeeming the value by weight opens up alot of opportunitys for fraud.In my state they would have gotten aluminum scrap weight for the cans-alot less. Bottles are worth virtually nothing here.