Luxembourg, 29/11/2004 (Agence Europe) - On 14 December the European Court of Justice will rule on two cases, the "Commission versus Germany" and the Commission versus Radlberger". Both involve the validity of the current system for managing non-reusable mineral water bottles and the "Radlberger" case involves the validity of the whole bottle management system - mineral water, beer and refreshing drink bottles.
A ruling is expected because of the economic affect and because it occurs three days before discussions on the new Bundesrat bottling system (regional parliaments). The decision from the court will determine whether Germany will amend its draft or not.
Advocate General Damaso Ruiz-Jarabo Colomer indicated that in these two cases, the German decree of 1998 transposing the European directive of 1994 on packaging waste was contrary to European law.
Due to environmental concerns, Germany set up a system of interconnected vessels and the number of re-usable bottles (mainly glass) and the number of bottles for single use only (mainly plastic) on the German market. When re-usable bottles are fewer than 72%, a mechanism is set off: single use bottle producers have to then pay for setting up a returnable bottle system. These producers say that they have another complicated system whereby they change the conditions for re-usable bottles by increasing their overall number above the 72% threshold.
Advocate General Ruiz-Jarabo Colomer thinks that this system is bad and contravenes European law in two respects: it contradicts the principle of legal security which single use drink bottle producers claim to use. The latter cannot control the reasons why consumers change their habits and change from one kind of bottle to another; it has discriminatory effects on importers because producers of non-German water sold in Germany sell 90% of their drinks in single use packaging.