Dive Brief:
- Tuscaloosa, AL will recycle glass after receiving a grant allowing the city to expand its services. The city expects to begin accepting glass for recycling in spring 2015.
- The bulk of the $200,000 grant from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management will go towards the purchase of a glass pulverizer. Another portion of the funds will be used for the construction of a glass recycling center.
- The remaining funds will be used to acquire a paper shredder to be used at the University of Alabama aimed at improving campus recycling.
Dive Insight:
Glass is known for being notoriously difficult to recycle because of the high costs of transporting the material and complications in the recycling process itself. In September 2013, the Ohio EPA partnered with glass manufacturers to encourage residents to recycle glass. The agency estimates that 90% of glass in the state ends up in landfills, and Ohio is working to increase the rate by adding glass recycling centers to simplify the collection process for the community.
Another state with a low glass recycling rate, Utah, may provide some guidance for Tuscaloosa. Cheap landfill tipping fees and the time-consuming -- and often dangerous -- elements of glass recycling have stymied the recycling rate there. One solution pursued in Wasatch, Utah was to open a glass processing facility that offers competitive rates while seeking out more alternatives for reusing the glass.
Tuscaloosa's glass pulverizer will render the materials into glass mulch, sand, and gravel to be used for roadbed projects, pipe insulation, and decorative projects around the city.