RetuRO, the administrator of the Deposit-Return System, the largest circular economy project in Romania, opens in Brașov County its third regional center for DRS packaging collection, located within the VGP logistics park.

With an area of 3,300 square meters, the regional center in Brașov is equipped with state-of-the-art packaging processing equipment, including PET and aluminum can counting machines, glass packaging counting machines, bunkers for glass storage, and baling presses. The annual processing capacity of the center in Brașov is over 240 million packaging units.

Gemma Webb, CEO and President of the RetuRO SGR Board: “As anticipated since the launch of the system, the gradual opening of the regional centers is coordinated with the increasing number of DRS packages put on the market. Currently, we have three RetuRO centers opened, which can process together over 1.7 billion packages annually, more than three times the total DRS packaging put in the market so far. We will continue to focus on expanding the infrastructure and in the next 3 months, we plan the opening of the centers in Ilfov, Dolj, Bacău, and Prahova counties.

DRS is a first as well as a tremendous opportunity for Romania’s changing for the better, to have a cleaner environment and encourage a responsible behaviour for each of us.”

The regional center will cover Brașov, Harghita, Covasna, Sibiu counties, and surrounding areas. Here, both manually collected beverage packaging and those collected automatically through RVM equipment will be transported. The operationalization of this DRS packaging processing brings new opportunities for green jobs locally, the new center having approximately 40 employees.

The Deposit-Return System has evolved constantly in the first months since its launch, with an increasing number of DRS packaging put on the market by producers during this period and returned by consumers in dedicated collection points. In the first 3 months, consumers have returned a total of over 23 million DRS packages, the number increasing exponentially from 31,000 units in December 2023, to 21 million in February, being estimated to over 60 million units to be returned in March. Most of the collected packaging has already been directed to recycling units, the last stage of this mechanism, thus confirming the efficient operation of the DRS.

The Deposit-Return System in Romania was designed based on the best international practices. At the moment, such a system is implemented in 41 countries worldwide and in 15 European countries, including Romania. Case studies show that in countries where it has been implemented, collection rates have increased up to 90 percent within 2 to 3 years.