Don’t throw away glass containers such as bottles and jars. Glass is not biodegradable, but it is 100% recyclable.
The energy saving from recycling one bottle will power a 100-watt light bulb for almost an hour, a washing machine for 10 minutes, a TV for 20 minutes or a computer for 25 minutes.
The raw materials for glass – sand, soda and lime – all have to be dug from the Earth. They are then melted together at 1,500ºC. This takes a lot of energy. Every tonne of glass that is recycled saves 1.2 tonnes of raw materials and the equivalent of 136 litres of oil energy.
Only 140,000 tonnes, or 20%, of all glass containers produced annually in South Africa are retrieved for recycling. About 550,000 tonnes of waste glass still finds its way into our landfills.
Notebook
- Sources: The Glass Recycling Company and British Glass
- Read more: How to crack glass recycling
This article was edited on 7 July 2023 to update editorial style, links and the image. No material changes were made.