Adding a "bottle bill" to Bermuda's legislation would go a long way to eliminating trash that is thrown on beaches, roads and into the water, according to local environmentalists, as roughly 50 percent of local litter consists of discarded bottles.

Speaking an a day-long environmental conference at Bermuda College on Friday, Gerald Begeman of Keep Bermuda Beautiful said the Island's `economics of trash' are completely skewed with the Island spending far more to process its waste than is generated by disposal efforts.

Discarded beverage containers are, by far, the leading objects of litter, Mr. Begeman said.

"It is mostly beer bottles," he said, "with Heineken, Carlsberg and Elephants being the most popular brands."

Mr. Begeman said there were a number of incentives to support bottle bill legislation including smaller land fills, less resource waste, a smaller burden on tax payers for waste treatment, improving the Island's image for tourists, creating safer beaches and roads, and, reducing hazards to wildlife.

Bottle bills - popular overseas for decades - attach a deposit to beverage containers which is paid back to the consumer when the bottle is returned to a designated location such as a recycling station or grocery store.

The key for Bermuda, however, will be setting a deposit amount that will make not littering - or stooping to pick up litter - attractive.

"What is a container worth," Mr. Begeman asked. "Is it worth a quarter in Bermuda?"

He added: "Consumers will pay more in the end, one way or another. If we must pay (to avoid litter) shouldn't we pay something to create a cleaner and healthier environment."

Even for the trash that is being properly disposed of is costly to the Island.

It costs $214 per tonne to collect and process garbage at Tynes Bay, Mr. Begeman said.

Almost 40 percent of the waste generated in Bermuda is paper, he found through a household profile of trash carried out with Works and Engineering statistics.

Food waste makes up the next highest proportion of local trash (18 percent) while plastics (15 percent), glass (nine percent), metal (five percent), wood (five percent) and others make up the remainder of the trash generated.

Plastics and paper are the two most commonly incinerated items at Tynes Bay.

And the amount of trash generated in Bermuda is growing consistently by almost two percent a year.

"That is why they are considering adding another line at Tynes Bay," Mr. Begeman said.

While a small amount of trash is recycled, with roughly 20 percent of households recycling, Mr. Begeman pointed out that the recycling facility is very near capacity.

Bermuda pays $5 per gallon to recycle paint, he added, 50 cents per gallon to collect and process used oil and ten cents a foot for fluorescent lighting tubes.

But consumers in Bermuda are not meeting the real costs of the trash they generate, and new solutions are needed, he suggested.

Environmental education will be key to reducing these numbers in the future, Mr. Begeman said.

School trash-o-thons, for example, can serve the dual purpose of raising funds and making students aware of the real environmental costs of garbage, he added, empowering the next generation to make better decisions.