Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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68. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment his plans to include a specific target for aluminium cans aside from general metal recycling rates as part of the deposit and return scheme proposal similar to plastic bottles; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28600/21]

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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69. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment his plans to include the same high collection and recycling targets for those beverage containers which fall outside the scope of the deposit and return scheme particularly glass to ensure there is an increase in ambition across all beverage container types; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28601/21]

Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein)
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70. To ask the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment his plans to introduce a takeback obligation on online retailers with no physical presence in Ireland who sell beverage containers within the scope of the deposit and return scheme in the Irish market; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28602/21]

Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 68, 69 and 70 together.Aluminium, plastic and glass beverage containers are all forms of packaging. The Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy details the measures that will be adopted to achieve optimum results in this area.The over-riding objective is to ensure that all packaging placed on the Irish market is reusable or recyclable in an economically viable way by 2030.

The recently renewed Ministerial approval for the national packaging compliance scheme, operated by Repak, sets out a level of ambition which will position Ireland as a frontrunner towards the attainment of EU packaging recycling targets including:  

- plastics recycling rates of 50% by 2025 and 55% by 2030;

- aluminium recycling targets of 50% by 2025 and 60% by 2030;

- glass recycling rates of 70% by 2025 and 75% by 2030.

To ensure we meet EU targets for the recycling of aluminium cans and plastic bottles, the plan also sets out a roadmap for the introduction of a Deposit and Return Scheme (DRS) for these items by the third quarter of 2022.  The DRS will operate as an extended producer responsibility scheme, funded by producers. In the third quarter of this year, the regulations for the Scheme will be finalised and a scheme operator to manage the DRS on behalf of the producers will be apointed.  A key goal of the scheme will be to ensure that all in-scope materials entering the State are treated equally.