Beverage container recycling: recycling centers and payments.

(1) The California Beverage Container Recycling and Litter Reduction Act requires the Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery to annually designate convenience zones and requires that at least one certified recycling center or location within every convenience zone accept all types of empty beverage containers and pay the refund value, if any, for those beverage containers at one location, and be open for business at least 30 hours per week, as provided. The act provides that a recycling center that consists of reverse vending machines or other unmanned automated equipment is "open for business," for purposes of the requirement to be open 30 hours per week, if the equipment at the recycling center is properly functioning, accepting all types of empty beverage containers at the recycling location, and paying posted refund values no less than the minimums required by the act. This bill would provide that a recycling center that meets those requirements is not required to have an employee present during the hours of operation in order to be "open for business." The bill would provide that a recycling center that is a reverse vending machine that accepts all types of empty beverage containers except those that are 3 or more liters in volume and those that are pouches is open for business if it provides an attendant to accept all types of empty beverage containers for no less than 10 hours per week, as provided, and is operable and properly functioning for no less than 70 hours per week. The bill would require the department to pay handling fees to those recycling centers, and would require those recycling centers to pay refund values, on the basis of the number of beverage containers redeemed through the reverse vending machines, and not on the basis of weight. The bill would require the department to determine the method of certifying the validity of the number of beverage containers counted by the reverse vending machine. (2) Under the act, a beverage distributor is required to pay a redemption payment to the department for every beverage container sold or offered for sale in the state by the distributor, and the department is required to deposit those amounts in the California Beverage Container Recycling Fund. The money in the fund is continuously appropriated to the department to, among other things, pay refund values and administrative fees to processors. Additionally, under the act, the department is required to calculate a processing fee for each beverage container with a specified scrap value, which is required to be paid by beverage manufacturers for each beverage container sold or transferred to a distributor or dealer. Under the act, the processing fee is calculated based on the recycling rate for each particular container type, which determines the fee at a specified corresponding percentage of the processing payment for that particular container type. This bill would specify that a payment made pursuant to the act, including, but not limited to, a handling fee payment, refund value payment, processing fee payment, or processing payment, may be made electronically.