Glass stockpile revives bottle-deposit call

Worries about a potential "glass mountain" of thousands of tonnes of bottles and other glass collected for recycling have sparked renewed interest in mandatory deposits on drink containers, says Green Party co-leader Rod Donald.

Mr Donald, who promised in his maiden speech in 1997 to draft a bill to introduce bottle deposits, said the huge build-up of glass meant re-introduction of deposits on drink containers was inevitable.

New Zealand's main glass reprocessor, ACI Glass Packaging in Auckland, has slashed the price it pays for used glass by 87 per cent, meaning many councils and recycling companies are receiving less for their "glass mountains" than the cost of collection.

ACI payments for recovered glass have been cut from $75 a tonne to just $10, as the company's Auckland plant cannot process all the glass available.

Tony Nowell - who chairs the governing board of a voluntary agreement to reduce and reuse packaging, New Zealand Packaging Accord 2004 - has said that the strength of the dollar meant large volumes of glass products had been imported recently, rather than manufactured.

Much of the imported glass was clear "flint" glass that was less suitable to recycle.

The board met yesterday to discuss a study of the dynamics of glass recycling by Covec, a company which offers independent analysis.

The board is due to continue revising Covec's recommendations next week.

Environment Minister Marian Hobbs has said that if importers fail to agree to take more responsibility for their used glass, legislation requiring more individual responsibility could be looked at.

In 2003, New Zealand recycled 48 per cent (about 80,000 tonnes) of glass. An estimated 90,000 tonnes was recovered last year.

Some councils and other recyclers are stockpiling glass until a solution is found. Some are looking at using glass in road foundations, and others at melting it for use in higher-value products such as tiles.

But another Green Party MP, Mike Ward, has proposed a bill which would extend producer responsibility to recycle manufactured goods, with the process overseen by a national waste conservation body.

The recycling responsibility would extend to a wide range of products, including tyres.

Mr Donald said breaking up bottles to put into roads or even glass tiles would be inefficient, because many bottles could be washed and re-used without wasting energy on a new manufacturing process.

He envisaged a 10c deposit on all beverage containers, which would also encourage the recovery of aluminium cans, and probably persuade bottlers not to use plastics, many of which were made from oil.

If glass and plastics had to buried in landfills, they should be put in specific sites so that the materials could later be "mined" when they became sufficiently valuable, he said.

Another advocate of bottle deposits, Warren Snow of the environmental planning group Envision New Zealand, thinks the consumer and producer of the glass should cover the cost of recycling.

"The container deposit or drink deposit is the best way to do it," he says.

Auckland City Council says it will continue collecting glass for recycling, despite growing mountains of used glass building up throughout the nation.

The council's resource recovery manager, Warwick Jaine, said that although the price had dropped the glass was still worth something.

"People should have confidence that the glass will continue to be collected and recycled," he said. "The city is not stockpiling it nor sending it to the landfill."

More than 230 tonnes of glass a week are collected from Auckland City's recycling bins alone.

Mr Jaine said the council would partly subsidise the loss in revenue for the city's glass-collection contractor. "If the losses continue over a one-year period it will cost each ratepayer around $2 a year, or 5c a week."

Wellington City Council has said it is looking at ideas such as putting glass into roads or using glass as drainage fill.

Christchurch already produces several products with its recycled glass, but is now looking at making glass tiles.

Some South Island councils are stockpiling the glass from kerbside recycling collections in the hope that a new recycling option will become available.

- NZPA