We respectfully ask your support to insure passage of national beverage container legislation. Oregon's Bottle Bill has proved that if it were national, it would end our litter problem. Litter is what we all see, but most people do not realize that it is only the tip of the iceberg. It is throw away containers that cost us unaffordable amounts of wasted energy and vast amounts of metals to be buried at the taxpayers expense, and become nonrecoverable. Individual states can legislate for deposit backed reusable bottles with fair success, but the nonreusable cans become a real problem. The writer spent two weeks in Oregon during December 1973, and called on many beverage dealers and several canners. Contrary to the circulated success stories, I found great disruption and resentment. This does not mean that Oregon's Bill is wrong. It means that legislation in one state at a time is wrong. With the passing of a national bill, the giant can and canning industry will be able to establish a national beverage can fund to receive the can deposit money at the canning level and make this money available for paying the refunds at the customer level. The metal beverage container industry will set up a can pickup service at the retail level. This will assure that all cans will be recycled. The revenue produced from recycling will be more than enough to pay the can control cost, and therefore, allow the can industry to make their product more competitive. (13 81) Recycling requires but 5% of the energy compared to producing metals from ore. By recycling over and over, the industry will have a continuous supply of metal, adding only a small amount of new metal to cover some unavoidable loss. No more beverage containers must ever be buried. The can industry has strenuously lobbyied against all state Ban-the-Can legislation, and with justification. Should they continue these tactics on the national level however, this should not stop us from passing the Bill as the result can only be a gain to the industry. Please find enclosed material giving facts on the can, and also how A.L.M. Engineering may, if required, be able to contribute to the success of this national beverage container Bill when passed. Thank you. EAA:W Enc. Sincerely yours, A.L.M. ENGINEERING CO. E. ARNOLD ARP RESULTS THAT WILL BE ACHIEVED BY THE PASSAGE OF NATIONAL BEVERAGE CONTAINER LEGISLATION: 1. Cooperation of the steel and aluminum canners should 2. 3. No job loss or transferring of workers, no disruptions Save millions of tons of steel and aluminum. 4. Stop wasting trillions of BTU's of energy. Recycling 5. Ban throwaway containers and require a uniform deposit 6. It will be mandatory that all bottles passing inspection The foregoing will be accomplished by the bottlers and canners meeting the law as required. Now we wish to apologize to all the Honorable Senators and Representatives, in that we did not make clear in our first mailing, of our completely new approach to the can and bottle problem. Your splendid response with letters and copies of several Congressional records are deeply appreciated. The opinions expressed in your letters and Congressional records directly reflect, as they should, on the controversial mess created by the Oregon Bottle Bill which was out to get the can at all costs and disruption of industry was of no concern. You will now understand that the millions of words written and opinions held, do not apply when this Bill is used to control and not to disrupt. Fortunately, the same Bill passed by Oregon, when passed on the National level and used as a Control Bill, will achieve benefits to our Country that no disruptive Bill could possibly match. The material enclosed will reveal a new and likely surprising approach for the complete solution of the controversial can and bottle problem. Now if you are still with us, please help get this Bill out of Committee and to a vote, and see how fast our canmakers and canners will get busy and comply. They intend to stay in business, and will one way or another. Thank you. EAA:IW Enc. Sincerely yours, A.L.M. ENGINEERING CO. E. ARNOLD ARP The can industry seems unconcerned about the future of their vast operations if there is passage of national beverage container legislation. This is evidenced by an article in the Wall Street Journal stating that the Joseph Schlitz Brewing Co., with can plants now in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Tampa, Florida, have two more under construction in Longview, Texas and Los Angeles, California, and have authorized the building of three new can plants in Winston-Salem, North Carolina; Syracuse, New York; and Memphis, Tennessee, at a cost of $100 million. This article, plus other can facilities expansion, raises a very important question. Would this nationwide industry take the chance of building for the future, if their total industry could be idled by the passage of one Bill by our United States Senate and House? This question suggests two answers. 1. The can industry must have the faith and confidence that they can stall legislation indefinitely. Littering would remain with an annual increase in the use of energy, plus added annual loss of millions of tons of steel and aluminum produced from virgin ores. This must be stopped! 2. The can industry must have a plan allowing them to continue their operations at such time that legislation is passed requiring a deposit system to get the cans back and mandatory recycling to indirectly produce new cans for use. These two alternatives are only conjecture, but the following are facts. We are an engineering organization that have had the foresight to design, develop, test and patent a machine around which a plan has been devised to meet all requirements of alternative 2. We have done research, experiments, and developments on this machine and plan for nearly four years, and have a working prototype and engineering drawings ready to go when the can industry is. 40-687 O 74 pt. 3- 39 |