Benefits of Recycling Glass
Recycling glass is just one way you can make a difference when it comes to reducing pollution and waste. Recycling glass:
• Saves energy needed to create new glass. Making products from recycled glass consumes 40% less energy than making new glass. Less energy used means reduced emissions of nitrogen oxide and carbon dioxide, both greenhouse gases.
• Reduces air pollution by 20% over making new glass.
• Reduces water pollution by 50% over making new glass.
• Reduces space in landfills that would otherwise be used by bottles & jars, etc. It takes as little as 30 days for a recycled glass bottle to leave your recycling bin and appear on a store shelf as a new glass container. It can take up to a million years to break down in a landfill.
• Conserves our natural resources. Every ton of glass that is recycled saves more than a ton of raw materials needed to create new glass.
Recycled glass has many uses. 80% of recycled glass ends up as new glass containers. It is also used in tiles and flooring, landscape applications, countertops, bricks, and even added to concrete pavement. Americans generated 12.2 million tons of glass in the municipal solid waste (MSW) stream in 2018. Only 25% of the glass was recovered for recycling. We can do better! Glass is one of the easiest materials to recycle. There is no reason we should throw glass into our landfills when it can be used endlessly and benefit the environment for years to come.
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