The Danish Pant - Bottle/Can - Deposit System
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- Опубликовано: 23 авг 2024
- Joshua talks about the Danish Pant system, how it compares to some places in the US, adjusting to the scheme, and recycling in general.
Info about the Danish system - danskretursyst...
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I once visited an aluminium plant in Iceland, and the guide old us a couple of interesting facts. Most important that it only takes 1% of the energy used to produce aluminium to recycle the same amount. But what really blew my mind was this: if US could gather used beverage cans as well as we do in Scandinavia, they would have sufficient aluminium to renew their entire aircraft fleet, military and civilian, EVERY THREE MONTHS!!!
😳 That's just crazy. GET STARTED AMERICA !
they are just crazy. if you see some of the footage from their carrier ships you will see that only plastic is compressed and returned to land. empty cans will be dumped in the ocean.
I just love the fact that you brought Pant with you abroad, and then back again. You should be Danish enough to get that citizenship just with that statement haha.
See, I am trying to integrate on all levels :).
What kind of monster would throw the pant away? That's just... wrong! 🤣
mans more danish then most of us for that lol
😂😂😂
The thing with these bottles is that they are all made of the same category of plastics (PET), which means they can easily reuse the plastic to create new bottles, while in the ordinary plastic recycle bins, there are loads of different types of plastic, so they have to sort it afterwards, and the plastic that can't be sorted is burnt. This means the deposited bottles has a higher value just because they know beforehand that they can be reused. This is something that speaks for the keeping of this system.
Good point.
For that reason i some times return bottles and cans bourght i germany. Cleaner PET and alu.
Denmark also has pant for glass bottles which Sweden doesnt.
@@karlkarlsson9699 yes, we had that system in Sweden as well until a few years ago, it had been running for many decades. The early 25 bottle yellow/orange/green cases got usually stolen (as vinyls fitted perfectly in them, for example) so they replaced them with the newer 20-bottle red case
@ in Denmark we use milk crates for vinyls
FYI, the receipt that you get when returning your bottles and cans to a store does not have to used to buy goods there. It can be redeemed for cash.
i was about to say this. also, you can get the money on you bank too
Also your pant receipt can only be used in that one store. For instance if you get your voucher at Føtex in Frederiksberg you can't use it at a Føtex in Nørrebro.
@@HannahJ obv. Store would lose money if you could buy anywhere with that ticket
@@jfc3552 you somehow read a reply, yet didnt read the original comment at ALL. the EXCHANGE from ticket to cash, is what hannah is talking about. meaning you CAN literally use the money you get, in any other place, literally go to the bar and get a cold one, whatever you want.
@@jfc3552 only reason for this is because systems and numbers.. you can just get the cash.
Re: Is the pant system/reward necessary?
It has been many years, but when I was a spry young boy, the flaske-pant (that was before aluminium cans became commonplace) was a easy source of income. Looking for empty bottles in parks was one way to earn a little pocket money. Today I think it is mostly the homeless and a few pensioners who actively goes around looking (and trash diving) for cans and bottles. Either way, I think the reward is an important part of why 92 % gets recycled, so yes, I think it is necessary.
In the big cities, it's all foreigners thats doing the collection of empty bootles.
it's a pain in the butt, to stand behind some romainian with a shopping trolley full of empty bottles.
is not a reward
@@jonaskallese4983 It is a reward if you found the bottle, and didn't pay anything to get it.
@@persimonsen8792 I'm not sure who you consider a "foreigner", but most people collecting empty bottles live in the country.
I am also not sure what makes it a "pain in the butt" to stand behind specifically a Romanian man with a trolley full of bottles (or anyone for that matter) - he is doing significantly more for the environment than you I am certain.
@@jensaugust743 Du kommer ikke så meget i storbyen. Når man står i kø, for at vente på en eller anden rumænsk sigøjner. Der kun er her for at samle pant eller begå krimnalitet. Så er det irriterende.... Når du går ind i din lokale Aldi i Tørre Røvelse, og ikke kan komme af med pant. pga ovenstående, det er ikke irriterende ?
Og gider slet ikke svare på hvad jeg gør for miljøet. Husk, hver gang du peger på nogen, så er der 3 fingre der peger på dig selv.
On the question whether the pant is necessary anymore, or if people would just recycle anyway. Yes, it is.
Far from everyone are returning their cans and bottles to the stores. Instead, they pass them on to others - either directly by donating them to the scouts if they come by and collect - or indirectly by throwing them into public waste bins where others then pick them up.
Also, on e.g. festivals, you’ll see people going around with big plastic sacs, collecting the cans where people drop them. Simply to be able to collect on the pant.
dont they allso at festivals and concerts have like a pant system for the plasticcups? my dad has stories about being guard/volentier at roskilde festival and then going around with my sisters and collect bottles and then they had the money for candy or toys.
@@lainightwalker5495 Yes, they do and they have it in Tivoli as well.
Yes indeed it is.
If in doubt, jut look at most big cities in the world (Bangkok for instance) without a pant system on water bottles and count the empty bottles lying everywhere :-(
yes and the beach or other places with many people.
That people can earn a little extra money for collecting waste, that are really bad to have lying around in nature is a good thing I think.
When I was a kid, all bottles were glass.
And these bottles were sent back to the manufacturer and recycled, they were washed and used directly again.
In contrast to today, where the packaging is remelted.
You could back then see, that a bottle had been through the system many times, was scratched and had a frosted look.
glass bottles were also crushed and remolded back then if the bottles were too damaged for use...
milk bottles back in the days did have reuse pante system on them .. break 1 and yo payed something for it
One thing that was lost in the transfer from the old wash and reuse bottle to the plastic and melt down reuse and I somehow think is rather sad is when you got your hands on a message bottle. Someone who previously drank from the same bottle and before handing it in etched a short message like hope you enjoy this just as much as I did or what ever kinda personalized the drinking of that content somehow making a connection between you and the autor of the message. You don't really get that type of "hygge" any more as every time you drink it will be from a one use cast bottle or can.
@@badnewsbadger6660 I don't doubt that this has happened, but this shouldn't have happened, as damaged bottles got removed from being reused.
@@dubious6718 I guess it depends on how you interpret to word "damaged". To me a damaged bottle it one that is sharded in one way or an other, mainly in the cap area where as a scratched in text might fly under the use and wear catagory. I was to young back then to work in cleaning and filling stations so I don't know what the standard was for recirculation or scrap.
I've also always held onto "pant-able" bottles and cans when I was out and about, so I could get my deposit back, but also to not litter. Good on you, Josh!
Back when I was a student I would - no kidding - go for walks about my town and pick up bottles. I would even crawl into bushes and ditches to pick up bottles and cans that people had thrown out. It made for good excersize and supplied my income with a little pocket change.
The infuriating part? A LOT of the bottles and cans I picked up had been bought south of the border, and therefore held no pant. I still took them to the machine along with the rest, of course. I think that speaks to why we need the pant system. People are more prone to just throwing bottles and cans away that they can't be bothered to carry, if they are not gonna get any money back from it.
the closer to the border you got the bigger the problem with cans without pant became - me and my buddy also used to roam ditches etc for bottles when we were young, made for good pocket money back then.
In Norway we had it since forever. Actually most machines are made here (Tomra).
Sweden here (jönköping) , some years ago my company made parts to Tomra. :)
Once again … never thought anything of our “pant”-system, but so cool to see someone not grown up and into it, ‘s, perspective on it. 👍🏻
Josh you are the man 👍🏻 really love the *”pant system”* personally i don’t go down whit the *”pant”* but never trow away the bottle, but i collect the bottle’s, and give em away to others in more need then me
Pant is part of the culture almost at this point. As a kid we'd always talk about going to "Fælledparken" and collect bottles during May 1st. People who do make a small fortune that day, and people are fairly good at saving their bottles and cans for kids rather than adult collectors. Would be awesome with more "pant" on more wares, it would improve the recycle rate, but too many items and I think the grocery stores will stop taking items and refere you to the recycling centers.
A tiny percentage are weird and rich.. but adult collectors are often homeless emigrants in need of everything, -so don’t save the pant for the kids.
Yeah, I used to make a shit ton of money on 1st of May and when there was football games at Parken, but now it's just gypsies and emigrants.
we went straight to the source when i was a kid, carlsberg and tuborg was on the road i lived in..
sometimes weekends we was over 20 kids jumping the fence for empty bootles.
in the end all those kids went around denmark in trucks every weekend when they got bigger, we was the reason emty bootles are protected better then car dealers 🤣
every monday we had 20.000-50.000kr in pant we needed to get rid of
most shops also left it more or less unprotected back then..
they can´t refer you to a recycling center. In the pant system a shop is compelled by law to accept any kind of pant on item they sell themselves
@@tobias9659 Homeless emigrants!?
You mean IMMIGRANTS/INVASIVE SPECIES from The Middle East, Africa and Central Asia.
I Have NEVER seen any homeless IMMIGRANTS/INVASIVE SPECIES here in Sweden, much less collecting bottles and cans for money, they get EVERYTHING THEY NEED FOR DOING NOTHING AND ARE PAID EXTRA FOR BREEDING.
I have seen older Swedish people collecting bottles and cans, and there are A LOT OF HOMELESS SWEDISH PEOPLE MOSTLY IN CITIES LIKE STOCKHOLM, MALMÖ, AND GÖTEBORG, SINCE WE SWEDES ARE SECOND CLASS CITIZENS IN OUR OWN COUNTRY
I guess you "good" person doesn't have children.
Living in a bigger city in Denmark, returning bottles is one of the more social activities I do day to day. There's usually a bit of a queue, so I'll be chatting with strangers about the weather and whatever. It's genuinely lovely. Gives that sense of community.
The monetary reward system has existed since 1942, in 2002 the A, B, C system was introduced. And yes it is still needed as a lot of people still throw away their bottles and cans, many are recovered by homeless, kids who want to earn extra cash and old people/students who is on a tight budget.
No it's much older.
Pant som begreb blev introduceret i Danmark i slutningen af 1800-tallet, hvor nogle mejerier havde pant på deres mælkeflasker.
Pantsystemet går tilbage til 1922, hvor bryggerierne i Danmark satte panten i system ved at indgå en frivillig aftale om at benytte en fælles flaske til øl i stedet for bryggeriernes egne navnemærkede flasker. Flasken blev i 1949 erstattet af en mere robust 33 cl flaske, der var bedre egnet til at blive genbrugt. Baggrunden for panten var begge gange en verdenskrig, der førte til ressourceknaphed, så panten var nødvendig for at sikre, at emballagen kom retur.
I think the pant system is needed.
Especially for the younger people.
Take a look at the Roskilde festival, or Distortion in Copenhagen.
We're not always good at cleaning up after ourselves, and I think pant is a good way to "train" young people, especially, when parenting seems to have failed.
this a million times, if only we could also put pant on chewing gum and cigarette butts and the streets would be clean as a whistle!
Quite a few festivals have started using a deposit system for things like the plastic beer cups that they sell drinks in, exactly because it's such an effective way to keep the festival area clean. Even if some patrons are too drunk to bring back their cups, there will be people who'll pick it up and bring it back for the money.
Then they just need a deposit system on all the rest of the crap they bring.
I think in cases like the Roskilde Festival, if they could make it more organized, and you could have an assigned spot for your tent etc. then you could put a deposit on the spot, and only get the deposit back when the spot was reasonably clean.
How much work that would require vs. the normal clean-up, I don't know.
Maybe you could use drones with cameras to quickly go and check a spot.
The Swedish "Pant"-system was the first of its kind, at least in the EU, it was introduced back in 1984, the Danes and other countries looked at this system and made their own versions of it.
In Denmark The Pant system started In 1942 i
back then it was on glass bottles for beers and sodas
20 years ago? I worked as a bottle boy in my mother's grocery store in the 70's. The system was not new then. When people brought in bottles, I would write them a coupon that they could redeem at the cash register. The machines came much later, of course.
You can redeem these coupons for cash. In some stores, you can redeem them for cash the same day, or use them for store credit at any time.
Had the same job in a supermarket in the early 80's. It was all manual handling of bottles back then.
As a child I also remember me and my friends going around collecting bottles many times, when we couldn't find anything better to do. Always found a some bottles that could be "traded" for some candy :)
The 'pant' system actually was invented as far back as 1942.
The reason even some gas stations have return machines as well is that every store that sells bottles with bottle-deposit are bound by law to also accept the empty bottles and pay out the deposit.
If the machine is nonfunctional you can actually request for the staff to manually count up the bottles as well
We were just in Copenhagen and during the Tour de France stage 1 people were coming around during the crowd and asking for our empty bottles and collecting them. I also recall those shelves on some trash cans in large public areas. Now it makes more sense.
As a danish student in denmark, it often gives a little boost at the end of the month to my economy to use the pant system 😊
Danish person here:
I want the pant (deposit) system to remain.
1. It keeps the return rate high, and it would definitely drop if it wasn't there.
2. It means less trash in our surroundings because homeless people will collect bottles that are left behind to earn a little pocket money.
3. Recycling the bottles in normal trash would be a loss. The bottles are made of specific plastic that makes it easy to reuse it as bottles again. This advantage would be lost if we put it in normal plastic bins.
Great vid, Josh. To your question about the relevance of the pant system: When they lowered the pant price some years ago (from 2 to 1 DKK, if I recall), there was a public debate about the system. This debate was almost 100% about littering and not about recycling.
If I recall, it was pretty well proven that the system dramatically lowered littering (compared to countries without pant).
However, our original pant system based on standardised beer and soda bottles also had another benefit: It helped the whole sector keep down the cost of producing, stocking and transporting the beverages.
The Danish deposit system goes back hundred years to 1922. In the beginning it was based on standardized bottles. In 2002 it was changed to any bottle size or form.
At first Faxe Brewery/Royal Unibrew took points for selling Pepsi Cola (Produced by a license) in Danish standard bottles
You mean 1942?
da.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flaskepant
Not to brag, but in Norway it started in 1902 🙂
I think without the pant system there would be quite a drop in redemption rate as people would care less about taking their cans and bottles with them when they are out and about. For instance in Copenhagen you can leave your used bottles/cans in parks as there is a 100% certainty that another person will pick it up for the refund. Not saying that it's cool to do, but the refund amount more or less ensures it to be picked up. There are also public trash cans with a little tray/shelf kind of thing on the side that can hold a couple of bottles/cans, that you can leave for others to pick it up. If the pant system would be removed I think you'd see lots of them litter around the city. Can't speak of the country side and how that works, but I know in southern jutland/jylland you can get cheaper soda/beer if you drive south across the border to Germany and buy from a border shop there that doesn't have Pant/refund, so I'd be interested in seeing whether there exists more or less garbage in those regions and conversely if the metal and plastic sorting amounts are higher. Anyway much love to my fellow Jyder!
Maybe we should ask Josh, if he knows what a "jyde-krog" ( "jute-hook" ( "-crook" ) ) is? 😂
I think that it's perfectly alright to leave your pant around for someone else to pick up. Heck most of our trash cans has a built in "pant-shelf" so that you can do exactly that.
Ofcourse take into calculations that if it's very windy your aluminium can will fly away, but your glass beer bottle, wont.
some people actually live off of the money they can get collecting pant.. so in a way you help the junkies and homeless ;) also imo never throw it into a wastebin.. leave it next to it so that the pant collectors dont need to stick their arms into waste.. be considerate of the less fortunate ;)
There is also a whole system for people wanting free money or is living on the streets that collect the bottles from those that just throw them. So if you want to get rid of a bottle and is walking around you can just stand it on like a bench or something and someone else just pick it up for money... That is pretty amazing too that recycle wise it is hard to not end up recycled. You have to like bury the bottles or throw them out in a bag with normal trash in order to not recycle.
some years ago, trashcans in some areas got little holders added so u can put the bottles ther so people dont have to sort thought the trash for them. i like that.
@@lainightwalker5495 I have not noticed but that is amazing and thoughtful
I love that you get just as excited about pant, as I do. 😘
Hi, In Norway we have a number of pant machines that support various charities. Here there is a button where you can choose to either get the money out in the store, (And of course shop for it) Or you can press a button for a lottery where you can win large sums. if you choose the lottery, your money is pledged for the charitable purpose. I think it's a great way to support good organizations and their important work. 😉
Same In Denmark. I always see Two buttons
Sweden too
@@gonz808 But do you have the lottery, where you can win up to one million?
@@abcabcboy no, it is only for donation
This brings back memories from my childhood. Before the pant machines we would take bags of bottles to the grocery store and a “flaskedreng” would count and sum the pant amount in the store. It was a sticky and smelly job. Also we didn’t have cans and plastic bottles in Denmark back then. Only glass bottles which would be cleaned and reused, so they all had to be sorted in boxes by the “flaskedreng”.
I work in bilka and i can tell you its still a sticky and smelly job 😅 Im the guy at the other end of the machines and people return bottle half empty and regularly full of cigarettes too 🤢 I think people forget "flaskedrenge" has to handle the bottles still. 😅
Pro Pant'er from Sweden here. Grown up with Pant, been Pant'ing for 37ish years.
On a fast machine I can process two cans or bottles a second so if anyone is in que behind me they won't be waiting for very long.
The thing about Pant is mostly about reducing litter, and even if you throw away your pant on the street, someone will pick it up and get your crown.
There are people making a living from just collecting cans. It's a very hard living tho, and you'll see people going through trash baskets in order to find pant.
Been there for decades.. and one may not think much about it at first glance, but it does adds up and it’s a win-win situation for sure.
Some People make a little earning collecting the pant cans and bottles that others have thrown away, that is a huge factor in the recycling system as well. Great video by the way
There are still a lot of people who throw these bottles/cans on the ground, but because the bottle/can has value, then it motivates others to pick them up and get the deposit money for it. I know stories of people who chose to pick up any bottle/can they can while they are walking the dog, or going to/from work, and they get a decent amount of money which is also a key factor to this being so great. So the whole part that if it's necessary, i think it is because that way you make sure it is not ending up as litter.
Btw yes i am danish
In Norway, the return rate for recyclable bottles was 95.1 percent in 2018 and the return rate for aluminum cans was 98.9 percent for cans. Most likely increased now. Norwegian company TOMRA is the market leader in its industries. TOMRA is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange (OSEBX) under the ticker symbol TOM. The parent company, Tomra Systems ASA, is headquartered in Asker, Norway, with central departments located in Mülheim-Kärlich, Germany and Shelton, Connecticut.
Someone else pointed this out, and I just want to add to the topic that plastic is not just plastic. Different plastic polymers can not be mixed and recycled with good end results, so the real value of this deposit sorting system is to actually differentiate between different plastic types - where bottles made of PET category of plastic are all ending up the same place which ensures much higher recycling benefit - while beverage cans that are Aluminium get sorted from other metals like steel which do not mix either and are tedious and difficult to sort manually at a recycling center.
If the pant system was not in place, it would risk that people would just mix their bottles together with the rest of their plastic trash as the majority of people don't know or don't care enough to sort individual plastic types without a direct incentive to do so.
In the end, net result from the pant system is that the end user doesn't lose anything from it, while the actual recycling facilities have a 10x easier job sorting recyclable trash which saves money for everyone and aids in a cleaner environment overall.
So I really don't see any downside to the system, and I think if the US could implement an interstate system of recycling deposits on beverages with meaningful deposits and not just a 5 cent insignificance, it could change things over time. Yea there will be some pushback initially because the system needs time to get up and running efficiently and the population would need to adjust to it to the point where people don't even question the fact that a regular bottle may be half a dollar more expensive at-purchase, because that extra cost is redeemed at a +90% rate anyways. It's a temporary tax, which hurts no one. And it has even provided a potential small source of income for homeless people who can gain a bit of coin by collecting the recyclable bottles and getting the deposit returns. You will see this in larger Danish cities like Copenhagen, where many trash bins around the city have small external bottle holders for people to place their bottles if they don't want to recycle themselves, and this offers homeless people an easy opportunity to collect them instead if they want to, without having to look through trash or pick them up from the street.
Its great knowing that the bottles will always hold some value when laying on the streets, thus incentivising someone to pick it up to get the deposit back. Its a great system
I live in Malmö and even i collect danish pant,haha so much danish cans around our town and Copenhagen is just a stonethrow away
So what kind of pant system do they have in Sweden for bottles
and cans?
Lower or higher deposits?
@@Bjowolf2 1 swedish krona for 50 cl bottle´s/can and 2 :- for the bigger 2 liters bottles
@@danielpersson7483 Thank you 😉
The Pant system is not outdated. I used to work at a Netto and everyday we had collectors making 1000's of kroner on bottles that would otherwise have been left to litter in nature. I know this because after work i would walk through the park (Kongens Haven right next to Rosenborg Castle) and it would be completely thrashed with german beer bootles without pant and pizza/junk food paper. So the amount of thrash the pant system prevents each day is enormous, but I will admit it's sucks to have to put 1 bottle into the machine at a time when you end up behind one of the collectors with 7 large garbagebags of bottles :D
A bit of info from one that has worked within the supermarket business for way to many years: If you want to sell a beverage in Denmark, you have to pay to "Dansk Retur System" (Danish Return System) - if you wont or dont, then you are not allowed to sell your product. Besides that if you want to sell beverages, like a kiosk, gasstation or something like that, you are also obligated to take bottles back, if any want to. The machines you showed are just for convience :)
I thank you very much sir.
You just made me 40 something years younger.
The pant system existed when I was 5-6 years old, and that must according to you have been around 2006-2008, even though my passport, my drivers license and other officiel papers say that I' from last milinnium more precise 1958
I remember so many days as a kid, spent searching high and low for empty glass bottles to redeem at the local store for candy. Can't imagine not living with a pant system!
Good video!
I wanna add, in Denmark we're starting a new concept regarding Pant.
It's for homeless people.
It's arrangements with companies, because companies who order drinks actually pay the supplier to pick up their Pant, and that's so companies won't have to pay a worker to run back and forth to Pant 100 or so bottles every so often.
And that is where the homeless comes in thru our organization and then pick up the companies' Pant and earn a bit of money.
Also gas stations will 99 of 100 times take Pant if you ask, they just don't have machines because of storage space issues.
Even the one in Fields will require a big room for storing clean and full containers, and machines that don't sort automatically have a conveyor belt and a kid who is getting high from the alcohol fumes all day 😅
No im just joking, we got that regulated, so people working the register will go and change bins, but it used to be a job people could be hired for from the age of 13, and it usually consisted of staying in oblong rooms with no windows for 4-6 hours a day.
Lets just say, Denmark failed at the early Pant system, but the idea is great and we've come far since then!
nessesary....yeah kinda. u still se alot of bottles and cans trown out in nature. another very importent part is that for a group of people its an extra imcome. plus it never fails to lift ur spirit and make u feel good to give a emty bottle to someone collecting pant.
Same system here in Sweden. I am not "native" swedish, so the first time was a bit "strange" but that was very fast to adapt, and change my mind for it. I can say, sorting the garbage 6-7 different place is no issue, not takes lot more time, and soon it will come automaticly, like a "walking". The issue if I travel to such country which do not have same system it has a physical pain to to drop everything to the same bin.....
The biggest flaw of the Danish Pant system is that it doesn't cooperate with the German Pfand system. You know that many Danes drive to Germany with trailers, fill them with a lot of mostly Danish bewerages there and reimport them. These bewerages are produced in Denmark, but canned/bottled without Pant! They are sold by the border shops at the German Danish border to Danes who then litter their beautiful country with all these cans and bottles instead of turning them in to the pant stations. As a German who has lived in Denmark for many years I find that really crazy.
Great video. I live in Copenhagen and did not even knew Fields have this feature. And amazing that we will have watermark in the future because that is the most refuriating (except for the guilt part) when going with 3 big bags of plastic flasks and they keep spitting out a bottle you know it should accept 😂
oh yeah. the arguments u can have with the mashine is hullarius. its allways fun to see after christmas/newyears/komfirmation season how people will come with wagons of bottles and cans.
Just hand in your large pile of pant at the end of the month, then it looks less shamefull :oD
The fact that so many Are collecting pant, and actually can create enough i come to sustaine an existance, indicates to mee that the high returnrate is not solely due to our willingness to resycle.
If the pantcollectors were not active the returnrate would be much poorer.
Very impressed by your understanding of the bottle/can deposit systems found throughout Europe. Your question if deposit really is needed nowadays with all the recycling may be related to drink containers being a source of litter outdoors (concerts/parks/recreational areas). Deposit then helps them to be collected by people in need of extra income thereby decreasing the need of paid-for trash collection service, a true win-win-win situation (person-nature-society).Important as PET bottles and aluminum stay in the nature for centuries.
I am retired, so I love to spend a lot of time on long walking/cycling trips, and I make sure to have a recycling bag with me to pick up what people have left of bottles/cans on the streets of Copenhagen, a month's deposit gave me enough money to buy food for a week = DKK 450.00, so yes, I think a deposit is still necessary (if only so that those of us with little money can pick up a little extra in everyday life)😊
Putting the CYCLING into recycling. Nice job!
so pant is also because we can't turn a bag into a bottle but a buttle can become another bottle, so to allow for more effecient recycling we sort them into their own, general plastic and metal and "consumption" grade liquid containers.
The pant system not only motivate people to return their bottles, but it also motivates pant collectors to actually pick them up from the nature where people throw them away, and that way cleaning up the nature.
We often collect these cans and bottles, since where we live, alot of young people get together to party outside in the parks and by the river with their soundboxes, and often leave behind a complete mess of cans and bottles. So we take a little evening walk now and then with a plastic bag, and collect them all.
Just in this summer break, we earned just about 3.400 danish kroner (466 US$) by picking up the huge piles of cans and bottles they left on the ground, and in the same way we're doing nature a favor.
We collected all the money in a jar, just for fun, to see how much we earned, and then we can always use them for something fun when we feel for it.
Here in Norway (or at least in the Oslo-area) we have different colored bags; one for food, one for plastic, and then paper/cardboard, glas and metal is in separate containers.
Regular waste is just put in grocery bags and disposed in the container with all the other bags.
I love the bag-system, since it all goes into one container.
Also the fact that our 'pant' system recycles bottles not as glass but as bottles for reuse, that goes for certain types of plastic bottles too. So no, it is not only for recycling, that is wasteful in comparison to reuse, because the whole (wasteful) manufacturing can be cut out and substituted by a (much cheaper) cleaning process.🤗
A quick note, you made it sound like you can only use the pant coupon for that store, but you can just get the entire amount in cash if you only have the coupon, or ask the cashier to give the pant money and pay with card :)
Dane here, just wanted to comment on a part you missed.
I didn't know they started doing these bulk pant systems where you can just empty a whole bag, however, I do know that you missed the whole 'pant station' option.
Across Denmark in more central location, they have build pant stations where a robot collects these special bags you can buy in a handful of selected grocery shops and other shops.
You simply buy these bags for 12kr for 2 pieces (It's refunded when returned, just like any pant) collect up to 5kg of pant in a bag, and return at any pant station.
At the pant station, you stick in your credit card, to register where the money are to be deposit. Put in a bag at a time, and when done you'll wait a couple of days for them do process and count the content of your bag, and the money are deposited into your bank account.
Thanks for talking about this!
Also, nice to see some shorter videos from your guys.
2:00 I do the same thing. It's "only" 50c/3dkr but it adds up over time and then it's not just some small amout. I usually get 100-200dkr in pant for bottles when I finally get to deliver them back.
It is not just beverage. Now, it also includes most other plastic bottles and cans from the grocery store, e.g. yoghurt & milk bottles.
Some years ago most of the deposit machines got an "donate to the Red Cross" alternative button. Most used in Copenhagen, less in rural Jutland.
As something with a crippling addiction to soda, I appreciate the pant system, even though I know I pay the money I get (back) when I buy the soda, but it’s also nice, cuz it’s kinda like a savings account that I physically have to go down and claim.
And it can be nice when money is tight to go down with my 3+ large sacks of bottles to get back quite a bit of money.
It all adds up. Among my parents friends there are a couple that walk their dog through the city park every evening. They started bringing a plastic bag for the bottles that they saw. It basically funds a vacation each year.
One time I arrived to the machine and found a guy there with two gigantic bags feeding it... He paused and let me handled my 20 bottles. Turned out he was cleaning trains for a living and would collect average10$ of pant every day.
In Norway "pant" started on glass beer bottles in 1902 that the breweres collected and reused. 120 years ago! And up to recently all our soda was sold on somewhat solid plastic bottles that was collected, washed and reused.
I believe removing the monetary reward (pant) would reduce the amount that is recycled considerably. A lot of people in Denmark actually do throw bottles/cans with pant out. The pant that does get thrown out this way however is picked up by people who are typically less well off or often homeless. There are even some who just do it as a hobby. I doubt this would continue if the monetary reward for recycling disappeared.
The success of this system is also due to the fact that different supermarkets had to accept bottles/cans from other supermarkets. Requires a national system.
That big machine at Fields looks cool! Hope we get more of those soon.
Same here, I have always wanted something like that instead of having to put them in one by one and to see that this is actually coming is heavenly :)
The financial part of it has an effect, the notion that you "lose money" if you not do it is enough to change your behaviour.. it comes to the fact that the money system en general are nothing but an uniform agreement upon how to interchange favors.. we all do agree on that those 100,- (insert currency) are that amount worth.. so we do not worry about that.. but the notion of losing x% of that, for not doing a little and somewhat convenient task makes the differents.. of x is big enough you will surely feel it in your budget if you not do it. Even the notion that you do not pick up a bottle, you pick up 1 kr or more makes it worth for children or adults to go out and try to find bottles or just pick them up on the way to get money. The key point beside the money part is the convenience of returning the "pant" it is as you stated at nearly every store.. for the most part you do not need to walk more than 5 minuts when you are in town to find a place to "pant it" and it is always in a place where you already goes to daily..
But think about it you got 100 kr every time you buy a soft drink you pay 1 to 3% of those 100 kr extra with promise that you'll get them back if you return the bottle..
Whenever I ride my bike, I have a "saddlepack" on the back and if I find a can (even if it's squashed) or bottle in the roadside, I quickly stop (while still being aware of trafic) and put it in the pack, if there's pant on it, free money, if not, I help keeping the are clean, metal cans without pant gets squashed and saved in a big plastic bag and when I have a couple of bags I take them to the local scrapyard where they can be sold as scrap metal (but they only want it if it's sorted and if you got enough for it to be worth it, you come with a kilo or so it's not worth it for them to buy, but if you come with 50+ kilo they will happily buy it) I get rid of trash, and get paid for it.
In Canada, we pay a deposit on all beverage containers including milk. You then return the “empties” to a bottle depot to get your refunded deposit. At home, we have curbside composting, co-mingled recycle and garbage pick up. We sort each item into the appropriate bin and off it goes to be recycled, turned into compost, or taken to a garbage facility. Just removing the recyclables and the compost removed SO much from entering the landfills. Great system.
I actually work at a gas station and one of my tasks is pant...
we don't have a nice machine for that but have two big boxes (one for cans and one for plastic) and a traditional beer case for glass bottles....
it's quite surprising how many people can't figure out that system and I have to sort them out by hand myself before we can get it picked up...
btw... the boxes has a large bag in it that can hold maybe a few thousand kroner of pant in them... so it can take some time to sort them out...
I think people know how to, but they take it for granted that someone else will do it.
@@SenemYucel19 It might be true, but I think it's super disrespectful...
When I was a kid in the 60s, we used to go to Tuborg Havn and steal beer bottles and clean them and sell them to the local købmand. Good way to make extra pockets money. I later worked at the factory making beer bottles.
Just watch Beau Miles doing the Kramer-Newman thing in Australia. Didn't work for him, but there are a second video coming next week about solving his problem. I pick up cans and plastic bottles here in Norway. Not enough to make a living but help a little with my supermarket expenses.
Here in Norway, scrapping returnables like this is extremely profitable. Pile up a bunch, turn em in, and you’ll get quite a bit for them.
The plastic from the pant is esay recyceld for new bottles as it is sorted as the right kind of plastic, unlike normal recycling
The pant system is definitely needed for recycling - especially among lower socio-economic groups. I live in a flat in an "almennyttig boligforening". Lots of people with low end jobs and lots of people on wellfare or state pension. It is no coincidence that our sorting system is a lot more simplistic here
Pant is great, and very needed. For students it's the holy grail. After a party you can come back the next day and collect a good amount of money. It's also great as I know many parents that make their kids pant for them, and in return the kids keep the money to spend as they like
Machines made by a norwegian company called Tomra. The system, not counting the machines, have existed for 38 years in Sweden. I think the machines came in the 90s, if I remember correctly. Denmark were actually later to the game. Not sure about Norway and Finland. Anyway, the machines and the system is growing all over Europe. And the four compartment system in the trash bins were invented in Sweden. In the University city Lund where I work. The idea came from the director of our sanitation department and a local entrepreneur developed the bins and tested it in Lund 2000-2001. Anyways, fun video. :)
There's another deposit system that is kinda like the one in fields, but you put in the whole bag, and you can get new bags at the same place, and then a few days later you get the money on your bank account. There should be 2 in Odense, and one in Køge, and 1-2 more other places in Denmark(so I've heard). It's great for truckers, or people who can't be bothered to stand and wait putting one bottle/can in a machine at a time. But I've experienced that they often doesn't work. Either because they are full, or something else
Yep, the one in Aalborg is always full. It's a shitty system, and they really should replace with something better.
I recently arrived in Denmark from the UK and we don't have anything like the Pant system there. I find the depositing so much fun, it's like a little arcade game seeing how fast you can scan everything. In the UK we do still have a milk man who brings products to your door in refillable bottles (you can get more than milk now like juice, yoghurt, soap etc and even plant milks) then the bottles are returned and reused. Closed loop systems are much better than recycling and this case there's no recycling involved. I'd love to see something like that here in DK.
The Danish pant system was originally a closed loop system where the bottles would be returned to factories, washed and reused. Back then even canned drinks were illegal because everything had to be glass (or plastic for soda later on).
However since glass bottles aren't standardized anymore and most things have switched to plastic the system has turned into recycle instead of reuse.
Modern pant bottles and cans are designed to be recycled into new bottles can cans, they don't touch the normal recycling system. So it is still closed loop but it is just focused on recycling instead of reusing like it was in the past.
I saw a clip somewhere of a store in perhaps France where you could go to the store with an empty bottle of shampoo, shower gel, etc and just pay for at refill instead of new plastic bottle.
That's a fantastic idea. I want that in Denmark.
@@Maitch3000 I'm not sure where you are but it does exist in Copenhagen! There's Løs Market and Helsam also do refills for some cleaning/shower products. It's definitely a newer concept here and there is less choice than elsewhere in Europe but hopefully will start to gain traction
@@aliciamundy5427 I didn't know that, but I am probably not going to Helsam to refill shampoo. I am hoping the concept goes into every supermarket.
Thanks for the Fields tip - live in CPH and didn’t know. I’ll bet it will be the future of the pant system.
Some years ago, a study was made comparing Denmark, to countries that does not have a "Pant" system. The Danish recycling "Pant" system, has a recycle rate of 98%, meaning that 98% of all beverage containers issued with a "Pant" sticker is returned for recycling.
Cans and plastic containers are broken up/demolished and the material is reused.
Glass bottles are returned to typically the brewery it came from. Checked if they can actually reused it and if not these bottles are melted down and formed into new bottles. Is the bottle reusable, it is thoroughly cleaned (using environmentally friendly detergents), refilled, relabeled and of it goes again. Glass bottles are estimated to live for about 100 refills, before it is scrapped as unusable and treated accordingly.
Drink containers are one of the thing we'll often use outside the home, so yes - if we didn't have pant, there would be beer cans everywhere.
Hey Josh.
I don't know if anyone have mentioned this to you yet (Apåologies if they have), but there is also the option of buying a pant-bag, wherein you can just toss all your pant bottles.
You can then bring the bag to a special station (google the locations) where you can simply deliver the bag, and the system will automatically pay out the pant amount to your bank account.
This way you don't need to actually put each bottle into the scanning machine in shops one by one. :)
In Finland the returning system has also been operating for decades. At the beginning with machines sorting out bottles with a pawn or not, there was a system based on scanning the shape of the bottle. Bottles were washed and refilled, plastic ones too. Now they read the barcode and its recycled only as material.
Now as the poorly glued on labels gets lost or damaged, you get nothing back. Great business for the company which takes the money from every sold new bottles that doesn't need to be paid back, cause of the condition. Also all of the aluminium cans must be in almost perfect shape for these machines to be able to read the code from the side. I do hope that they put the barcode also in the bottoms of the cans, so you can crush them before returning. Now the best before date is printed there, instead of the top where it - at least in my opinion - should be.
If you crush 130l sack of cans, you fit them in 13l bag. Same amount of paid aluminium pawn already made for more convenient transport ahead, but maybe still lesser business for recycling companies as crushed cans are trash...
The current pant system is from 1942. There was one in WW1 but it was dismanteled after the war was over.
You hit the nail on the head. Not only are people more reluctant to literally throw money out the window, but if they do, it'll be worth it for someone else to pick it up, when it's not just considered trash. If you go along the road and see what is there on the ground, mostly it'll be foreign beverage containers, that are not directly valuable, unless you have bulk to sell as a commodity. With the pant system, or Dansk Retursystem as it's called, every little can or bottle counts.
I deal with returnables in Norway, and there’s loads on the floor just waiting to be harvested. Made over 2000 nok by cleaning up the floor messes.
Funny story: 😉
Many years ago, when the deposits where just 50 øre etc., I had over time been collecting 100s of my glass bottles in plastic bags in a closet - glass bottles that I just hadn't bothered returning, as they were much heavier than the plastic bottles and aluminum cans of today.
So when the deposits suddenly went up to 1 kr from 50 øre ( etc. ), I actually made quite a nice 100 % profit over night 😂
Reminds me of when I went to pant a flatbed full of glass bottles that came in plastic-rack-boxes from my garage only to realize upon my arrival they have discontinued that scheme years ago. Thousands of kr in deposit for nothing!😂
@@mgntstr and now they are back as a retro collectors item and sudden worth alot again :D
We sure need this system.
great system, we almost never see a plastic bottle or can's thrown out in the wild or around in the city here in Norway, a good solution
When we stop the pant for glass bottles in Norway the return drop a drastically and the result is much more glass out in nature now. Even compared to back when nearly all bottles was made of glass.
You do need the financial reward for taking the bottles to the machine, even in Denmark. Good example is the German cans people buy because they are cheaper than soda in Denmark, where people are throwing them in random trash bins or sometimes in the forest. You are less likely to see trash in smaller towns, but it can be an issue in bigger cities, as the responsibility is shared over more persons (likelihood of getting called out for dropping trash out of your pocket is less).
The pant system is great. When I lived with my roomie, back when I was studying, we used our pant for a nice big meal at the end of the month.
Also on another note, some of the trash is burned and used for heating in like houses. We have a plant that sorts and burns trash in my town and they are also receiving trash from other countries like the UK because they do it differently and therefore can’t get rid of theirs San then they send it over to us and we get some money and heat out of the deal.
You can visit the recycling plant here (where I live) and see how it all works. They also clean waist water (aka the stuff from the sewers). Which you can also see how they do that.
Great Video, just a FYI, there is someplaces where you can go, and put in your credit card, and then you can just pour the whole bag into this huge container shaped thing that process and counts everything and just direcly deposit the money from the pant to your bank account.
As you mentioned this system is the same all over Scandinavia. Here in Norway, the glass bottles were removed from the pant-system a few years ago because there were so few products being sold using them. Since a lot of people don't have their own recycling bin for glass containers at home, but have to take them to a central collection site (just as you would do to pant them), they can't be bothered to because they don't get anything back from doing it. Instead their glass bottles end up in the misc. garbage and are not recycled. This is the main reason I'd say we should keep the system for cans and plastic bottles.
Great video! Short and succinct 😊
Regarding the trashcan/recycling system - it completely depends on your municipality.
In Aarhus, we still only have 5 categories, while my mom in Holbæk is sorting into 9 now.
Recycling was supposed to be standardized nationally last year, but only 12/98 municipalities reached the goal..
Should be 68/98 at the end of this year, though! 🤞 Consistency is key.
68
Idk if this is politically incorrect to say but I like the system because it’s a big help to a lot of homeless people. I purposefully leave my pant in the little compartment on the trash cans so someone who needs the money more can get it. It kinda feels like blind tipping.
Hi here a Little different perspektiv on the pant system and trash sorting . The pant system is handlet by the Breweries and saving them extra costs like environment/climate tax, getting materials for new bottles and so on. having pant on bottles also keep people from just throwing them in nature, and even if someone do, others pick them up like kids or homeless people. The garbage collecting system is funded by the realestate tax so sorting trash in advance helps keep the costs down on prossesing it. it dosent matter if you own or rent a house/apartment the owner need to pay the tax and he needs to cover it with the rent if he rent out. There are also that garbage is most likely produced at your home so it is eeasy for you to sort. Bottles are quite often just bourght on trip out and thrown away, the pant makes you want to return it.
Great video. I grew up in Greenland for a moment and the PANT exchange was a little bit more but learning it at a young age was great as a young kid. I'm curious how it is in the Faroe Islands.
I really love our return service 👍👍👍🇩🇰🇩🇰🇩🇰
i remember when i was a kid, bicycling along the road i would find and take all the cans and bottles and pant them so i can get some candy. good times :)
Josh, the pant system is very old,and was created to have standardized glass bottles returned for reuse, and only danish bottles had pant, and metalcans and plastic was banned, I think until the mid-90-ties, when i worked after school people would bring their emptys you write a note that they could redeem at the cashier, it gave a lot off school kids work to sort the bootles, the machines started also mid 90-ties!! It kept Denmark clean, and you would notice whenever you travelled to other countries!
Sweet memories of the bygone days when you would get 5kr for a big bottle, 2,5kr for a medium, and small bottles and cans where 1.5kr :D.. those were the days