Glass Recycling

 

Glass recycling is the process of turning waste glass into usable products. Glass waste should be separated by chemical composition, and then, separated into different colors. The major types of glass used for consumer containers are below.

 

Glass makes up a large component of household and industrial waste due to its weight and density. The glass component in waste is usually made up of bottles, broken glassware, light bulbs and other items. Adding to this waste is the fact that many manual methods of creating glass objects have a defect rate of around forty percent. Glass recycling uses less energy than manufacturing glass from sand, lime and soda. Every ton of waste glass recycled into new items saves 315 additional kilograms of carbon dioxide from being released into the atmosphere during the creation of new glass.

 

Glass that is crushed and ready to be remelted is called cullet

 

Glass has a $14 per cubic yard charge for disposal.

 

 

 

Color	Type of glass	Uses
colorless	Flint glass	food, beverage, beer, liquor and wine bottles
green	Green glass	wine and beer bottles
brown	Brown/Amber glass	beer and liquor bottles

 

 

 

 

 

Glass Recycling Facts

	Every month, we throw out enough glass bottles and jars to fill up a giant skyscraper. All of these jars are recyclable!
	The energy saved from recycling one glass bottle can run a 100-watt light bulb for four hours or a compact fluorescent bulb for 20 hours. It also causes 20% less air pollution and 50% less water pollution than when a new bottle is made from raw materials.
	A modern glass bottle would take 4000 years or more to decompose -- and even longer if it's in the landfill.
	Mining and transporting raw materials for glass produces about 385 pounds of waste for every ton of glass that is made. If recycled glass is substituted for half of the raw materials, the waste is cut by more than 80%.