What happens to glass?

Did you know?

Glass is 100% recyclable and can be endlessly recycled with no loss of quality.

Where your glass goes

The glass bottles and jars collected are sent to a recycling plant. New glass is made from four main ingredients: sand, soda ash, limestone and other additives for colour or special treatments.

The importance of recycling glass

Recycling glass is important because all these raw materials have to be quarried, using up natural resources and utilising energy for extraction and processing.

The recycling process

Once glass is collected and taken to be reprocessed, it is:

• mechanically colour sorted, if required
• crushed and contaminants are removed
• mixed with the raw materials to colour and/or enhance properties as necessary
• melted in a furnace
• moulded or blown into new bottles or jars

Examples of new items

Recycled glass can be used to make a wide range of everyday products, including:

• new bottles and jars
• glass wool insulation for homes, which also helps with energy efficiency
• water filtration media