On the counter rests a small display of tiny bottles, each wrapped carefully in brown shipping paper and labeled with a green-and-white sticker that reads “Underberg.” Inside is 0.7 ounces — 20 ...

It’s part of a push to make the bottles more recyclable. “Technically, green-colored plastic is recyclable,” says Alpa Sutaria, sustainability leader for the Coca-Cola Company North America ...

Turns out, green plastic isn't green in the environmental sense. A colored bottle contaminates the recycling stream and has to be separated out, increasing the chances it ends up in a landfill.

Coca-Cola is discontinuing the iconic green Sprite bottle to shift to clear plastic from August 1st in a bid to become more environmentally responsible.

From there, colorant is blended into the pellets, which determines the color of the bottle. Each batch uses about 40 pounds of colorant. Today, Nalgene can make over 75 differently colored bottles.

Meanwhile, back in D.C., the green-labeled bottles began to sprout up throughout the metro area. “It really picked up steam in 2016, and since then we’ve seen exponential growth,” Wells said.