Grant Keeps South Island Glass Recycling On The Up
The Forum funded
a grant of just over $11,500 for the construction of storage
bunkers at 5R Solution’s new glass recovery facility in
Hornby, which opened in January. 5R Managing Director Chris
Grant explains the facility was built in response to the
increase in glass being recovered in the South
Island. “With the back of the old facility broken
from a logistic management perspective it was imperative
that we hit our peak season in the new facility. It is
thanks to the GPF in approving the bunker blocks that
enabled 5R to have a smooth transition from old to new
facility,” Chris says. Glass Packaging Forum Scheme Manager
Dominic Salmon says 5R plays a crucial role as a hub for
aggregating glass bottles and jars collected from
Canterbury, Otago and the West Coast. “Sending glass to a
hub so it can be transported in bulk to Auckland to be
recycled makes transport much more efficient and
cost-effective, which means we can recycle more glass,” he
says. The grant will ensure 5R can store hundreds of
tonnes of colour-sorted glass (green, brown and clear) as
well as mixed glass, Dominic says. “Queenstown Lakes
District Council implemented a new kerbside glass collection
service in July last year in Queenstown and Wanaka, which is
expected to divert nearly 2000 tonnes of glass from landfill
annually. The bunkers are crucial for storing and processing
this glass so it’s quality as a recyclable material is
maintained,” he says. Glass recycling in the South
Island has been on the up in recent years, with latest
figures showing 23,836 tonnes of glass made its way to
Auckland for recycling in 2018. This was up 10,399 tonnes
from 2016, Dominic says. “As more South Island councils
move to the best practice of separate glass collections at
kerbside, then we only expect to see this upward trend
continue.” The GPF has funded over $220,000 in
grants in the past two years for projects in the South
Island which improve glass recovery. “The South Island
faces unique challenges in terms of collecting and
transporting recycled glass, but we have seen investment in
key projects make a big impact,” Dominic
says. Improving glass recycling is the core function
of the GPF, which runs the country’s only
Government-accredited, voluntary product stewardship scheme
for glass bottles and jars, Dominic says. The GPF has
to date funded over $3.4 million in grants for projects
ranging from infrastructure to public place recycling,
events, and research. This funding is sourced through the
GPF’s product stewardship scheme, which has 100 member
brands that pay a voluntary levy based on the amount of
glass they put to market. Glass is recycled at the
country’s only glass container manufacturer O-I New
Zealand. Using recycled glass
to make new glass bottles and jars reduces the need for
virgin material – in fact, 1kg of recycled glass replaces
1.2kg of virgin materials. It also means the furnaces can
run at a lower temperature so there are less emissions,
Dominic says. According to the latest information from O-I,
every 10 percent of recycled glass content reduces emissions
by 5 percent and generates energy savings of approximately 3
percent. “A great little statistic we’d love
people to keep in mind when doing their recycling is that
the energy saved by recycling a single bottle could light a
15-watt low-energy light bulb for 24 hours,” Dominic
says. South
Island glass recycling has been given a boost after the
Glass Packaging Forum helped upgrade the 5R Solutions hub in
Christchurch.
“The 5R team are excited to
have this new facility operational with our increasing
demand to push recycled glass to the North
Island.”
Glass going to landfill is huge waste of
valuable resources as it can be infinitely recycled in New
Zealand, Dominic says. It’s also one of the most
sustainable packaging materials.