A glass-sorting facility in Tauranga, New Zealand will help to divert about 3000 tonnes of glass from going into landfill each year.
The facility at Te Maunga Resource Recovery Park was opened earlier this week and received about $47,000 for the project from the Government’s waste disposal levy allocated to Tauranga City Council.
In addition to accepting glass bottles and jars, Te Maunga will also start accepting flat glass, including from windows and doors, which will be sorted and stored before it is then sent to other facilities to be recycled.
The flat glass will be recycled into new products such as insulation, and the glass bottles and jars will be used to make new containers.
More than 80% of the funding for the project came from the Tauranga City Council’s allocation of the waste disposal levy. The facility for Auckland based flat glass recyclers 5R Solutions is jointly funded by Tauranga City Council, the Glass Packaging Forum and EnviroWaste.
The Glass Packaging Forum, an industry member-based, accredited product stewardship scheme for encouraging glass recycling in New Zealand contributed $7,635.
The levy for waste disposed of at landfill is to help communities and businesses develop initiatives that increase reuse, recovery and recycling, and decrease waste to landfill.
More than $76 million has been collected throughout the country via the levy since it was established in 2009.
