Festive spirits (and beers and wines) indulged, according to Return and Earn data

Or maybe we’ve seen the value of recycling cans and bottles thanks to the lure of a 10-cent refund for eligible containers.

Whatever the reason Orange’s two Return and Earn reverse vending machines have been kept busy receiving plenty of containers in the past two weeks.

Official figures reveal 503,183 containers were deposited in the Orange return points from December 21 to January 2.

That’s 29 per cent up on the month before, when 389,741 containers were deposited from November 23 to December 6.

A spokesman for the NSW Environment Protection Authority said the Return and Earn scheme had been successful in collecting more than a billion containers at NSW return points since it started.

“Orange has contributed to this success with more than 7.8 million containers returned at the reverse vending machine since Return and Earn commenced in December 2017,” he said.

“The EPA is encouraged by the people of NSW continuing to contribute to the scheme during the holiday period.”

However, bins were overflowing with rubbish at both of Orange’s venues, Woolworths North Orange and Flip Out in Edward Street this week.

Most of it appeared to be cardboard containers people had used to bring their empties to the machines.

They were piled up around a large skip bin at the Flip Out site.

Figures released before Christmas show Orange’s machines received about six million less items than the amount recycled in Dubbo and was also was well down on Bathurst’s total.

Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton said the first year of Return and Earn had led to an increase in the number of containers being recycled compared to when people could only use their residential yellow recycling bins.

“More than half the drink containers in the marketplace (54 per cent) are now being recovered, compared with the 32 per cent that was being collected in yellow bins before Return and Earn,” she said.