Joining a nationwide campaign against Pepsico Inc. yesterday, Princeton Environmental Action urged the soft drink company to increase its recycling efforts.
PEA asked students in the Frist Campus Center to sign a 4-foot-high paper cutout of a Pepsi bottle and organized a public meeting in advocacy of their cause.
In conjunction with the Grass Roots Recycling Network and EcoPledge.com — two national environmentalist groups — PEA is protesting Pepsi's "failed promise" to use recycled products in its manufacturing of plastic bottles.
In 1990, both Pepsi and Coca-Cola pledged to use 25 percent recycled material in their products. Both companies have since fallen short of that goal.
"We're protesting [against] Pepsi because they do not use any recycled products in their bottles," said Lauren Siciliano '05, who organized the protest.
Pepsi says it all comes down to economics. The company followed up its 1990 promise by using recycled products in some of its bottles sold in California, said Dave DeCecco, a spokesman for Pepsi.
Recycling technology at the time increased the price per bottle by five cents, and consumers did not react favorably, he said.
"We were surprised to find that consumers wouldn't pay extra money for recycled bottles — even something as small as a five-cent increase," DeCecco said.
According to statistics cited by PEA, more than 25 billion plastic soda bottles are sold annually in the United States. Each year 114 billion plastic bottles are taken to landfills rather than reused in recycled products.
Pepsi recently acquired Quaker Oats and its subsidiary company Gatorade, which had been a primary user of recycled plastic in its bottles for eight years before the sale.
After acquiring Gatorade, PEA says, Pepsi told them to stop recycling.
At the protest, PEA collected more than 200 signatures on the bottle, which they plan to send to Pepsi's corporate headquarters in Purchase, N.Y.
"Students have been very interested," Siciliano said. "The bottle gimmick creates an awareness about the issue that most people do not necessarily have."
Since the 1990 pledge, Coca-Cola has taken greater strides to increase their use of recycled materials. The previous target of EcoPledge.com and GRRN's consumer campaigns, Coca-Cola says it is now using 10 percent recycled material in three-quarters of its bottles.
Meanwhile, Pepsi sent a letter dated Feb. 20 to all of its bottlers declaring "a new goal of 10 percent recycled content in [its plastic] containers by 2005 in the United States."
Already using recycled content in both aluminum and glass containers, Pepsi said adding plastic containers to this list is a "responsible initiative [that] will further enhance [its] system's leadership in recycling and environmental sustainability."
Siciliano, however, remains skeptical.
"Making the initial move is a positive first step," she said. "But Pepsi has not made the administrative and factory changes to make that possible. They have not backed up their promise."
DeCecco said Pepsi has been looking for years at various ways to make economic and environmental concerns compatible. But only recently has technology made that possible.
"We've discovered new technologies," he said. "But it takes time to get everything in place with the bottlers."
PEA members say they will remain committed to their cause until they see action.
"Pepsi is already behind others in the industry — it's time we force them to stand up," PEA fliers say. "We must demand Pepsi recycle now."
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