idea - returnable take out bins

Thanks to the ontario’s governments great new idea/plan to return various liquor bottles to the beer store, i’ve come up with another idea.

The amount of garbage i create has gone down considerably since i’ve got a compost.  The most massive thing that gets added to my garbage these days is take out bins, styrophoam, and i guess the tops of the metal ones.  What if various environ-concious restaurants (ie green door, table) joined a program where their take outs were actually decent plastic/pyrex/ceramic containers with good tops (microwavable of course) and charged a deposit for them, say, 5$.  Each of the bins/containers would have some sore of id/barcode/something on the bottom so as to discourage falsifying them for the 5$.  Any store that took part could have the (dirty) containers returned to them.

I’m thinking a place like the yangtzee could cut down massively on landfill if they did this.  Think about the amount of landfill they take up in a night for their hot and sour soup take outs?  I must take up a cubic metre a year just on those styrophoam things…  i’d gladly pay a 5$ deposit for each thingy, could exchange them with the delivery guy after the first purchase, etc..

Well?  Would it fly??  Been done?