It may seem innocuous, and is no doubt unintentional, but the EU has introduced a policy which has quietly ruined plastic bottles. As part of their effort to drive down single use plastic waste, drinks bottles will come with attached lids. “Tethered caps”, as they are known, have been floating around Europe for the last couple of years and will be mandatory by summer, to ensure that both bottle and lid are recycled.
You might think Brexit would give us the luxury of loose caps, but we’re getting them too because most companies aren’t going to make different bottles for different parts of Europe. So much for freeing ourselves from the shackles of bureaucracy.
I’ve since realised it’s a clever way to move us away from single use items — by making measurably worse alternatives
I had one of these new water bottles the other day and it was awful. The cap scratched my nose every time I took a sip and water spilled down my shirt. The rest leaked into my bag because it isn’t obvious whether the cap is screwed on properly. I raged at what felt like a performative rule. Can’t they just tell everyone to recycle their caps? Weren’t we all doing that already? Why can I no longer live in the EU, nor have my caps untethered?
But I’ve since realised it’s a clever way to move us away from single use items — by making measurably worse alternatives. It’s worked on me in the past. After one too many office lunches enduring the abject misery of a Pret soup with a disposable wooden spoon, I’ve started bringing metal cutlery with me to work every day. I might even invest in one of those steel straws with a smug little case, to avoid the grim user experience of snarfing an iced latte through a flaccid paper tube.
A greener future will only be reached by both inconvenience and incentive. The UK is finally following in Germany’s footsteps and will bring in a bottle deposit scheme next year, where we will get money back for recycling drinks containers. We need more policies like this, which nudge people towards sustainability by removing frictions rather than adding them.
But for now, the guilty pleasure of a plastic bottle is over for me. They will be pure, tethered guilt, and I will drink with alacrity from my reusable bottle. It seems determined to chip my tooth and smells like a pond after two uses, but at least I feel good about it. And the lid comes off.
