(VIC) Mandate Tethered Bottle Caps to Beverage Containers

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Author: Meghna Mallik, Olivia Limson, Roma Heanly, Prachi Sharma, Siahn Fraser, Virginia Wills, Ketut Divya S Bhavani, Oneli Hewawithana, Vittoria Galgano, Alizee Bourgault  | Publish date: 23/6/2026

• P: In VIC, caps on single-use plastic beverage containers can be physically separated from the bottle.

• S: The VIC Minister for Environment should amend Regulation 134B of Division 2 of the Environment Protection Amendment (Banning Single-Use Plastic Items) Regulations 2022 (VIC) to include ‘untethered plastic closures on beverage containers’ within the established list of banned items. 

• E: The Werribee River Association (WRA): [recommends that] ‘Australian Governments … mandate tethered bottle caps.’

Problem Identification: 

Regulation 134B of Division 2 of the Environmental Protection Amendment (Banning Single-Use Plastic Items) Regulations 2022 (VIC) lists single-use plastic items that are banned from sale and distribution. However, untethered plastic caps and lid closures on beverage containers are not included. 

Thus, bottles may be legally sold and distributed with caps that may be separated from their bottles. BeachPatrol Australia (BPA) stated that ‘plastic bottle tops are a significant [avoidable] contributor to pollution, littering beaches and landscapes across [VIC].’

Context: 

According to Debbie Rovere, Campaign Lead for the Boomerang Alliance, bottle caps are much harder to recycle when they are not left on the bottle. The Australian Bottle Co explained that it is significantly harder to recycle bottle caps as they are made from a different plastic than the bottle itself and often cannot be recycled on their own. The Association of Plastic Recyclers noted that untethered bottle caps often ‘end up in the landfill.’  

A tethered cap refers to a plastic closure that, throughout the bottle’s lifecycle, ‘remain[s] physically attached to the bottle even after opening.’ The Conversation reported that tethered bottle caps prevent littering by placing the onus on manufacturers to design items that are recyclable.

BPA reported that plastic lids ‘have been among the most frequently littered single-use plastic items found on Australian beaches.’

VIC has a target to divert 80% of waste from landfill by 2030.

Arguments:

BPA noted that the commercial sale of untethered bottle caps has contributed to avoidable litter and plastic pollution in VIC. Birte Moliere, packaging product stewardship lead of Boomerang Alliance, emphasised that untethered bottle caps ‘often either become litter or end up in landfill.’ The Environmental Working Group argued that as plastic caps degrade, their chemical additives irreversibly leach into water, soil and air. Dr. Ross Headifen, President of BPA, noted that without a tethering requirement, ‘millions of bottle tops … leak into our environments’ each year, and that volunteer clean-up efforts ‘simply can’t keep up’ with the ongoing pollution. 

Beyond Plastics stated that untethered bottle caps are readily ingested by birds and marine wildlife that mistake them for food. CSIRO reported that ‘90 per cent of all seabirds alive today have eaten plastic of some kind.’ The Department of Climate Change, Energy, Environment and Water (DCCEEW) reported that marine debris persists in the environment, causing injury and death through ingestion, entanglement and internal injuries.

BeachPatrol Australia noted that untethered bottle caps are a missed opportunity for recycling, as tethered bottle caps ‘greatly increase the recycling of the bottle cap material.’ Akhras et al. (2023) from Johannes Kepler University explained that bottle caps are often ‘discarded separately from the bottles … drastically reducing their recycling potential.’ In VIC, the Glen Eira City Council stated that ‘bottle tops are too small to be recycled on their own. Their small size means they fall through sorting machinery and are lost as waste.’ The Australian Packaging Covenant Organisation found that consumers complied with recycling label instructions to replace caps on bottles only around 30% of the time.

Advice/Solution Identification:

The Werribee River Association (WRA) and the Boomerang Alliance have both called for a mandate on tethered bottle caps for beverage containers in Australia. WRA has stated that this could stop ‘millions of bottle tops from being landfilled or littered,’ and stop ‘plastic from entering our oceans at its source.’

Precedent:

There is domestic and international precedent for mandating tethered bottle caps. Since 2024, the EU's Single-Use Plastics Directive has mandated ‘attached caps and lids’ to beverage containers. Additionally, NSW has planned to mandate tethered bottle caps by 2030 through its Plastics Plan 2.0.

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Public Support: 

1. Werribee River Association (WRA)

The Boomerang Alliance - A group of 55 national, state and local groups that have explicitly called for ‘tethered bottle caps’ in their campaign for a container deposit scheme across Australia.

2. AFROCAB

3. Arid Lands Environment Centre

4. Australian Conservation Foundation

5. Australian Marine Conservation Society (AMCS)

6. BeachPatrol Australia

7. Better Buds

8. Boomerang Bags

9. Cairns and Far North Coast Environment Centre

10. Clean up Australia

11. Conservation Council ACT Region

12. Conservation Council of South Australia

13. Conservation Council of Western Australia

14. Cooks River Alliance

15. Cooks River Valley Association

16. Environment Centre NT

17. Environment Tasmania

18. Environment Victoria

19. Friends of the Earth 

20. Gold Coast and Hinterland Environment Council (GECKO)

21. Good for the Hood

22. Granite Belt Sustainable Action Network 

23. Green Music Australia

24. Greenpeace Australia Pacific 

25. Householders' Options to Protect the Environment (HOPE)

26. IDEP Foundation 

27. Lake Macquarie Sustainable Neighbourhood Alliance

28. Lane Cove Sustainability Action Group 

29. LEAD Group

30. Living Ocean 

31. Local Government NSW

32. Manly & Freshwater Surfing Reserve

33. Mineral Policy Institute

34. Nature Conservation Council of NSW

35. No Balloon Release Australia

36. No More Butts

37. North Queensland Conservation Council (NQCC)

38. Our Seas Our Future

39. Plastic Bag Free Victoria

40. Plastic Free July 

41. Plastic Free Sunraysia

42. Positive Change for Marine Life

43. Project AWARE Foundation

44. Queensland Conservation Council

45. Responsible Runners

46. SEA LIFE Trust 

47. Sea Shepherd Australia

48. Seaside Scavenge 

49. So Shire

50. Sunshine Coast Environment Council (SCEC)

51. Surfrider Foundation Australia

52. Take 3

53. Tasmanian Conservation Trust 

54. Total Environment Centre 

55. Two Hands Project 

56. Wildlife Preservation Society of Queensland 

57. Zero Waste Revolution Canberra        

This list reflects publicly stated positions and should not necessarily be taken as endorsement of this specific brief.

News Coverage:

• CSIRO - “Good news, beach lovers: our research found 39% less plastic waste around Australian coastal cities than a decade ago”. This article reported on CSIRO’s 2022–2024 national coastal debris survey, identifying hard plastic bottle caps and lids as among the most frequently encountered items across 6 Australian cities. By: Stephanie Brodie & Britta Hardesty | 7 Apr 2025 - Read the article here.

• PKN Packaging News - “Push for tethered bottle caps to reduce waste”. This article reported on the joint advocacy by BeachPatrol Australia and the Boomerang Alliance calling for Australian governments to mandate tethered caps. By: Navan Kaur | 30 Sep 2024 - Read the article here.

• Packaging Insights - “New South Wales announces measures to phase out single-use plastic”. This article reported on NSW’s measures to tackle single-use plastic pollution, particularly its Plastics Plan 2.0, which aims to introduce tethered caps for plastic bottles by 2030. By: Libby Davis | 13 Nov 2025 - Read the article here.

• ABC News - “Losing the war on waste: On a pristine Australian island, the seabirds have become so full of plastic they crackle and crunch”. This article reported an increase from three-quarters of Australian Shearwaters carrying 5-10 pieces of plastic to every single bird carrying 50 or more pieces, on Lord Howe Island. By: Jake Evans | 15 May 2025 - Read the article here.

Where to go to learn more: 

1. (2025) Cutting Plastic Pollution at the Source: Opportunities for improving packaging in Australia | Australian Marine Conservation Society (AMCS) - This report advocated for reducing plastic pollution and has called for design changes, such as tethered lids to prevent loose plastic from entering the marine environment. Read the report here. 

2. (2025) Litter Report FY25 | Clean Up Australia - This report found that beverage litter, including bottle caps, accounted for 62.6% of all litter counted in the 2025 Financial Year and highlighted the mandating of tethered bottle lids as an effective measure for litter prevention. Read the full report here.

3. (2024) Cap Hack: Tethered Caps Will Slash Waste and Litter | BeachPatrol Australia, Boomerang Alliance - This joint media release from environmental groups, BeachPatrol Australia and Boomerang Alliance, has called for Australian governments to mandate tethered bottle caps on beverage containers. Read the full release here.

4. (2023) National Packaging Solution, Best Practice Stewardship Scheme for Packaging | Boomerang Alliance - This report has stated the importance of producer accountability, encouraging the packaging industry to take full responsibility and pay for the costs of its waste and pollution decisions. Read the report here. 

5. Environment Protection Amendment (Banning Single-Use Plastic Items) Regulations 2022 (VIC) - Read the full Regulations here.

Human Perspective: 

On a Saturday morning along a creek in Melbourne’s west, Aisha joined a local clean-up group. She spent an hour picking through grass and mud, pulling out bottle caps one after another. They were everywhere: caught in the grass, lodged in the mud, floating at the water’s edge. Volunteers told her it was the same every month. Aisha had recently returned from a trip to Europe where she had noticed that plastic bottle caps were tethered to their bottles. This was a small design change that she had not thought much about at the time. Back home in Melbourne, it was immediately clear to her that no such requirement existed. At the clean-up group, Aisha learnt that bottle caps were among the most common items collected: small enough to slip through stormwater drains, light enough to travel far, and easily separated from the bottles they once sealed. What struck Aisha most was what happens to caps once they come loose. Many are significantly harder to recycle; they fall through sorting systems or are rejected as contamination. Even when people dispose of their bottles correctly, the caps often end up lost to the environment anyway. By the end of the morning, the group had filled dozens of bags. But they knew the next rain would bring more. For Aisha and the other volunteers, this felt less like a littering problem and more like a design problem. The fix, as they saw it, was simple – keep the cap attached to the bottle so it stays in the system, out of parks, out of waterways, and out of landfill.

To protect the anonymity of those involved, this is a fictionalised account drawn from an amalgamation of real-life stories, experiences and testimonials gathered during the research process for this brief. Any resemblance to actual individuals is purely coincidental.

Conflict of interest/acknowledgment statement: 

Dr. Ross Headifen (President of Beach Patrol Australia) confirmed their support for this recommendation and provided quotes in a meeting with FORE Australia held on 15 April 2026.

Debbie Rovere (Engagement Lead for the Boomerang Alliance) confirmed their support for this recommendation and provided quotes in a meeting with FORE Australia held on 28 April 2026.

Support 

If your organisation would like to add your support to this paper or suggest amendments, please email Info@foreaustralia.com. 

Disclaimers

Please review all FORE disclaimers here.

Reference list: 

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Australian Marine Conservation Society. (2025). Cutting plastic pollution at the source: Opportunities for improving packaging in Australia. Accessed 26 March 2026. https://www.marineconservation.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/AMCS_CuttingPlastics_Online.pdf

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Boomerang Alliance (2025). The Boomerang Alliance and our allied environmental groups are calling on Australian governments to mandate tethered bottle caps following new laws in the EU aimed at stopping billions of bottle tops from ending up in landfills or as litter. LinkedIn. Accessed 14 May 2026. https://www.linkedin.com/posts/sustainability-plasticpollution-tetheredcaps-ugcPost-7244531526644736000-fT05?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop&rcm=ACoAADcgyeMBsGuhF6i2nfLXFyfB99_Qdj2uDPg 

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