On October 1, 1972, the Oregon Minimum Deposit Act,¹ popularly known as the "bottle bill," went into effect. The first state act of its kind, the controversial Minimum Deposit Act seeks to reduce roadside litter by requiring refunds to be paid on all beer, malt, and carbonated soft drink containers and by banning pull-top cans. The main force of the law is directed against popular use of disposable beverage cans and bottles, a significant step inasmuch as the Crusade for a Cleaner Environment recently estimated that it now costs the nation $1.5 billion per year to dispose of cans, nonreturnable bottles, and plastic containers.

In promoting the use of returnable beverage containers, the Act has a three-fold purpose. Primarily it is a latter reduction measure. However, the law also provides a way to conserve energy, since returnable beverage containers have a considerably lower energy loss than disposable cans and bottles. Finally, the law promotes a method of resource conservation other than recycling, which has had little concrete success in Oregon. Rodale's Environmental Action Bulletin reports that glass returned by local citizens to a Portland Owens-Illinois bottle manufacturing plant represented less than five percent of the plant's total production.