Legislators will again consider whether Iowans can continue to redeem deposits on cans and bottles during their trips to the grocery store.

Sen. Mark Segebart, R-Vail, introduced a bill this month that removes grocery and convenience stores from the law that now mandates retailers to redeem cans and bottles.

Opponents say the bill would make it tougher for Iowans to redeem the nickel deposit they pay on beer, soda and liquor purchased in Iowa, and undermine the 41-year-old program's success.

"Bottom line for consumers is that it makes it less convenient for them," said Sen. Claire Celsi, D-West Des Moines.

Celsi unsuccessfully fought this week against the bill moving from subcommittee to the full Natural Resources and Environment Committee for consideration.

A similar bill was proposed in last year's session but failed to pass.

In recent decades, the state's more than 300 redemption centers have dwindled to around 100.

The bill would also increase the handling fee paid to retailers from one cent to two cents. Supporters say the increase would help financially stabilize redemption centers.

Segebart said redemption centers in rural Iowa are struggling to stay open, including nonprofits that collect cans to help employ developmentally disabled workers. "They're losing money at (only) a penny a can," he said.

Grocery stores have long complained that the cans and bottles are a nuisance, filled with beer, pop, bugs, cigarettes and worse.

The Iowa Grocery Industry Association would like to see the container deposit eliminated and Iowans encouraged to recycle cans and bottles curbside or at regional drop-off centers, said Michelle Hurd, president of the group.

Iowa's recycling program is robust compared to what it was in 1978, when the law was passed and bottles and cans filled the state's ditches, she said.

"Recycling in the state is growing," Hurd said. "We think that's a better solution."

Iowans redeemed or recycled 71 percent of 1.8 billion bottles and cans purchased last year, down from 86 percent in 2007.

Another 563 million containers went into the landfill, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources said.

Celsi said she has friends and neighbors who recycle cans and bottles, believing the money they get from the deposit isn't enough to justify bringing them in to be redeemed.

She would like to see a bill similar to one introduced last year that would have added bottles and cans that contain water, sports energy and other drinks. That bill, too, would have doubled the penny handling fee for retailers and redemption centers to help cover their costs for such things as collecting and sorting the containers.

It didn't call for changing the deposit, which Celsi would like to see doubled to 10 cents, giving consumers greater incentive to redeem the containers.

That would help address the problem of an "avalanche of plastic bottles filling our landfills, ditches, rivers, streams and oceans," she said.

Hurd said many Iowa stores lack the space to expand the bottles that are redeemed.

"Our survey results show that consumers strongly oppose that, and we would oppose that as well," she said.