Auckland City Council
Media release
17 August 2009

New sorting plant will boost NZ’s glass recycling

A decision to build a major new glass sorting facility on council owned land at the Onehunga recycling plant has been welcomed by Auckland City Council as an important breakthrough in glass recycling for the country.

Glass container maker Owens-Illinois (O-I) New Zealand and Visy Recycling New Zealand Ltd, which operates the materials recovery facility (MRF) at Onehunga, have announced that an expanded high-technology optical sorting plant will be built next year to feed glass for recycling at O-I’s manufacturing plant at Penrose.

The development coincides with O-I New Zealand’s new furnace, which will open in 2010 and use a large proportion of recycled glass in its production of bottles and jars.

“The council’s far-sighted approach to the MRF – a joint venture with Manukau City Council – had future developments like this in mind for land we leased to Visy,” said Councillor Aaron Bhatnagar, chairperson of the City Development Committee.

“It will also answer those ill-informed critics of the so-called ‘glass mountain’ which has been accumulating at the MRF specifically for eventual use in opportunities such as the new furnace.”

When operational the new plant will process virtually all the recyclable glass input for remanufacturing through the new furnace.

The new optical sorting equipment is from a specialist manufacturer in Europe and has the capacity to sort 100,000 small pieces of glass the size of a fingernail, per minute, into individual colours while detecting and removing contamination.

O-I New Zealand says that the agreement with Visy will maximise glass recovery opportunities in New Zealand, leading to greater environmental benefits such as less virgin material use (sand), reduced waste to landfill and reduced CO2 emissions.

ENDS

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