Did anyone watch Shop Well For The Planet last night

[Workingman]

Don't believe the myths about RECYCLED GLASS.

[Suff]

Did you really just punt me an EU wide document from an organisation which is located on the Avenue Louise, Brussels (where I once lived)?

I was talking specifically about the UK in that last Post.

Let me give you a different article. It is talking about the UK 2030 target and the absolute need for an 80% remelt target instead of aggregate (which is what happens today in a large way).

https://www.packagingnews.co.uk/news/ma ... 07-06-2021

On the need for a recycling/remelt target, Phil Fenton, lead packaging and recycling adviser, commented: “We all know more needs to be done to increase recycling and move towards a circular economy for all packaging formats. Glass can be recycled endlessly back into new bottles and jars, and it makes both environmental and economic sense to do so. Recycling a tonne of glass into new bottles and jars saves 580kg of co2 emissions – saving over 594,000 tonnes of CO2 in 2019. Alternatively, if recycled glass is used as aggregates, it actually produces more carbon. This is why we are so concerned that a DRS that crushes or compacts glass with no recycling target will be detrimental to bottle-to-bottle recycling and to the environment.”

[Workingman]

Yes I did. Well, NO! FEVE is not an EU institution it is a European association of glass manufacturers, a different thing, and the UK is a member. So is Turkey.

Your link is comparing the proposed UK Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) with kerbside recycling (bottle banks) in the closed loop recycling system favoured by the public.

Recycling is the bit that saves the 594,000 tonnes of CO2. Using old glass as an aggregate (in concrete) is the bit that actually produces more carbon. Why? Because all that already made glass has to be replaced with new glass, and that requires raw materials - silica sand, limestone, feldspar and sodium carbonate. The mining, transport and processing of these newly dug up materials is where the totally new CO2 comes from.

Each time one tonne of glass containers is recycled in a furnace 1.2 tonnes of virgin raw material does not need to be quarried, processed and transported.

It is not hard to understand.

BTW: being located in an EU country does not automatically make something EU. An office in the UK does not make something 'British".

in the UK alone we generate 100 Million Tonnes of CO2 more than just dumping them in the ground

Link?

[Suff]

Ah, the article is rather obscure as to whether the glass is being recycled to 80% today or not.

The original article I was liked to on a climate site stated that virtually no glass was being used for new glass.

If you go to Germany they have bins for each colour of glass. They are turning that glass into feed for the glass furnaces.

The reason that I read for the UK not using our glass that way was the lack of separation at collection and also a substandard product at the end with limited use.

But never mind, both documents are by industry pressure groups. One which is EU wide and focuses on lobbying Brussels for sound bytes.

Anyway, I believe we're beyond the original scope.

[Workingman]

This is what you originally said without any link, and my rebuttal was to that:

If you are a manic bottle recycler you might as well just get that 4x4 monster fuel guzzler. Because in the UK alone we generate 100 Million Tonnes of CO2 more than just dumping them in the ground and making new glass because of the way we recycle them. Every Single Year. We'd be better just sticking them in the ground but everyone feels so halo like for all the glass they recycle. It fits the message, don't worry if it is the wrong thing to do.

It is a work of fiction and you got found out. Stop wriggling and move on.

In Europe glass is optically sorted before being turned into cullet no matter how they are collected. Life is easier if you have different collection bins, as we do in the UK, but it is not essential. My local collection point has bins for clear, coloured and mixed and it is not in Germany. Mind you, there will always be some bonehead who puts coloured bottles in the clear bin, and clear bottles in the coloured bin - hence the final optical sorting.

[Suff]

It is a work of fiction and you got found out. Stop wriggling and move on.

Moving on.