Dang, I am so glad that you asked that because I've been wondering that as well in the last couple weeks. I noticed that the cash register receipts are glossier than plain old office paper and I don't like the sort of choking smell that they have either.

I am confident that someone on this forum will have the answer. This is the best forum on Gardenweb--we have to most extreme obsessive-compulsive gardeners and composters and it is simply the best!

i believe it uses thermal printing.. so the paper is impregnated with the ink. I can't see it being the same soy ink used in standard printing... but i am not a scientist by any means. I would shred and recycle if possible.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_printer

Oh, that's great. I often keep register receipts and ATM slips in my wallet for days, where they get a lot of handling. Thanks for that excerpt.

Ugh-o. Thank you. To the trash it is!

Yeah, bummer news, but thanks for the thorough answer!

I have bad news. Not only is BPA in cash register tape, it is showing up in most paper that is recycled with PCW (post consumer waste).

We have been reading the $30M studies on BPA that were funded by stimulus money, and the problem is serious. Also, beware of any register tape that is "BPA free". It might be BPS, its awful cousin. HINT: to tell if paper is thermal, which is the stuff actually coated with one of the heat sensitive phenols, rub the paper with a coin. If the friction discolors it, it is thermal. Wash your hands.
And stay away from alcohol sanitizers, since these act as a solvent so the skins absorbs up to ten times more than with simple dermal contact.
We are putting together a data base of the studies, and if anyone is interested, we will post it when we have it up to speed. I am glad you are talking about this, because it is a very serious, and so far mostly invisible problem.

The short answer is - it depends.

Thermal paper has chemical coatings on the surface of the paper. Bond paper doesn't have any coatings on the paper. Is the receipt shinny? It is probably thermal & is coated.

FYI: not all thermal paper has BPA. BPA is in the news, but the alternative is BPB & there hasn't been nearly enough studies on it to call it a safer alternative. Do some research on BPA & form your own opinion.

Since 2010 (when the info bi11me posted above was published), things have been moving along and there are definitely BPA free receipts available. However in a quick search I was not able to determine how much of the receipt business has switched over and how much still contains BPA.

There is no evidence one way or the other whether it would survive composting and actually end up in your vegetables in a significant dose.

Therefore, the cautious approach would be to not compost them for the time being.

My 'qualitative' opinion of the process is that it would take an awful lot of receipts to result in a significant dose. But OTOH receipts are a small volume of paper that goes through the average house, so not recycling them is not a big deal. I don't think I would put them in my compost.

BPA breaks down very rapidly in soil in aerobic conditions. Some studies have found a half-life of only 3 days in soil (see link below, and google 'bpa soil half life' for more). I think in an aerobic composter the BPA will be broken down very quickly. Furthermore, I have also seen references that many plants metabolize any BPA they take up into more harmless substances. So my policy is to compost receipts as that seems to be the most environmentally-friendly way to dispose of them. Because of the short half-life in soil, I don't hesitate to use that compost in my garden -- if any makes it through the composting process (doubtful, though I haven't seen studies), it won't last long in the garden.

Here is a link that might be useful: Fate of 14C-bisphenol A in soils

Well done Randall! I used to do those kinds of env. fate studies with radiolabeled test compounds. Just didn't think of looking this up. It was the obvious next step.

It's clear now that *handling* BPA receipts will cause much more exposure than composting them.

wow this is the best blog I ever read, I usually just breeze through a blog for two seconds, can't find my answer, and move on. I found all this information extremely enlightening. I had read a bit about BPA as I am expecting my first child and want to avoid any contact via me or the baby. I had heard receipts were considered glossy and no good for composting but I wanted to double check. Knowing that composting is actually a way of helping reduce the environment hazard of BPA (at least in a tiny sense) is the coolest thing I've heard in a long time. Thanks Randall and this whole group for all the good information!

Glad to be of help, and happy composting!