Market Status Report:
Container and Plate Glass

Table of Contents

Preface

I.  Introduction

II.  Container Cullet

• Definition of Container Cullet
• Supply of Scrap Material
• Primary Factors Affecting Supply
• Projected Cullet Supply
• Demand for California Cullet
• Projected Demand for Cullet
• Primary Barriers to Material Supply/Demand
• Strategies to Overcome Barriers

III.  Plate Glass

• Supply of Plate Glass Cullet
• Demand for Plate Glass Cullet
• Primary Barriers to Material Supply/Demand
• Strategies to Overcome Barriers

IV.  Summary

• Glass Beneficiation Industry
• Glass Container Manufacturing Industry
• Fiberglass Manufacturing Industry
• Strategies to Improve Cullet Recycling

I. Introduction

This status report provides information for container and plate cullet. Section II addresses the container cullet supply and demand factors, market development barriers, and strategies to enhance container cullet recycling. Section III addresses the market, barriers, and strategies to improve the market for plate glass and other construction and demolition glass.

II. Container Cullet

The primary cullet market in California is the container market. The glass container manufacturing industry is a mature industry that has gone through continuous consolidation over the past 15 years. The consolidation has meant that older, higher-cost plants were closed. New processes and equipment have helped the glass container industry to compete with other packaging materials but as the market share for glass containers has declined, the demand for California cullet has also been reduced.

According to the Board's waste stream composition data, glass (food and beverage container and plate) represents about 1.3 million tons (3.5 percent) of the material disposed in California in 1991. The Department of Conservation (DOC) has more recent information which indicates that about 620,000 tons of container glass were collected in the state last year. DOC estimates a 73 percent recycling rate for California Redemption Value (CRV) glass containers.

Most diversion of container glass occurs through the efforts of private recyclers and local government curbside programs. Most of the glass collected in the state is used by glass manufacturers to produce food and beverage containers. The second largest market for cullet is fiberglass production.

Definition of Container Cullet

The Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, Inc. (ISRI) has published specifications and practices that apply to container glass cullet purchased and sold in the United States and Canada. These cullet specifications are divided into two categories: unprocessed and processed cullet.

Unprocessed container cullet is defined as broken or whole scrap glass. Specifications for unprocessed culled are listed for flint (clear), amber (brown), and green (emerald).

The specifications also describes the amount of cullet color segregation allowed. For example, flint can contain 95 to 100 percent flint and 0 to 5 percent amber, green, and other colors.

Processed container cullet is defined as crushed and whole contaminant-free scrap container glass which is furnace ready. The size of the cullet can vary from whole glass containers to minus 100 mesh. The ideal material size is 3/8 inch to 3/4 inch with a 10 percent minimum of fine particles. Material size is based upon buyer and seller's agreement. The cullet cannot contain ferrous and non ferrous metals, ceramics, or other glass (e.g., plate window, heat-resistant, and lead-based glass). The specifications also describe the amount of cullet color segregation allowed. For example, total non flint cullet must contain less that 5 percent flint cullet.

Supply of Scrap Material

Cullet is diverted from the waste stream through programs operated by local jurisdictions, waste haulers, private recyclers, and community service organizations. After the material is diverted by these programs, it flows to processors' "glass beneficiation facilities" which crush, clean, and size the cullet and sell it to glass container manufacturers and fiberglass producers.

Recent technology development, spearheaded by the Gallo Glass Company, allows glass container manufacturers to use recycled glass contaminated by ceramics and stones. In the past, the pieces would either become a weak spot in a bottle or the pieces would sink to the bottom of the furnace and reflect heat into the furnace wall. The result was often damage to tiles and expensive repairs. When the pieces of stone or ceramic contaminants are pulverized in the newer technology, they are melted with the cullet and become an integral part of the new container. Recovery of contaminated cullet has been so successful that landfilling of recycled glass is extremely rare. Firms that are on the lookout for scrap glass for glasphalt or other applications will seldom find enough scrap glass for their projects.

The Department of Conservation (DOC) reports that 620,732 tons of food and beverage container glass were collected in California in fiscal year (FY) 1994-1995. This figure does not include plate or automotive glass. DOC reports that buyback centers collected the largest amount of cullet in the state: over 385,500 tons (62.1 percent). Curbside programs provided the next largest amount of cullet, 192,427 tons (31.0 percent), while the remaining cullet, 42,830 tons (7.0 percent) moved into the system from drop-off, reverse vending machine, and community service programs.

Estimates of the amount of plate and automotive cullet diverted from the waste stream are not available.

Primary Factors Affecting Supply

The primary factors affecting supply of cullet are:

• Availability of glass food, drink, and beverage containers in the waste stream.
• Amount of California Redemption Value (CRV) deposit which will affect the number of CRV containers sold in California.
• Household / Business participation in glass recycling.
• Ability and motivation of local jurisdictions, waste haulers, and private recyclers to divert and recycle glass from the waste stream.

Price is not a major issue at this time since cullet prices have been relatively stable over the past couple of years. Certainly, though, if the price of cullet were to increase substantially, additional supply would come available.

Projected Cullet Supply

The market share of products packaged in glass food and beverage containers has been decreasing over the last several years. Glass container production reports indicate that 1995 may represent the industry's lowest output in over a decade. If this trend continues, less container glass will be available in the waste stream to divert.

In California, the glass beneficiation industry as undergone a major consolidation over the last year. Most of the volume of cullet is now controlled by one company in the state. This consolidation may produce some processing efficiencies in operation, however material prices could reflect the lack of competition in the cullet markets. The price received by recyclers for recycled glass could be reduced and the price end users pay may he higher.

Demand for California Cullet

In California, cullet demand exceeds supply. According to DOC data, California container and fiberglass producers used 740,000 tons of cullet in California in 1994. The difference between the amount of cullet used and the amount of cullet collected (119,593 tons) was made up from cullet imported into the state and the use of recycled plate glass. The amounts of imported cullet and plate glass used for container and fiberglass production is not known.

The demand for cullet in California is driven primarily by the production rates of California's glass food and beverage container and fiberglass manufacturing industries and the State's minimum content requirements for food and beverage containers and fiberglass. AB 1340 (Statutes of 1991, Chapter 706, Eastin) requires fiberglass producers to use at least 30 percent postconsumer cullet in fiberglass building insulation made or sold in California. SB 1178 (Statutes of 1990, Chapter 1094, O'Connell) requires glass food, drink, and beverage containers manufactured for sale in California to use at least 35 percent postconsumer cullet.

Another factor affecting the demand for California container cullet by California container manufacturers is the uncertainty of product manufacturers importing empty glass containers into California and filling the containers with product. If this occurs, fewer containers will be produced in California with the consequent reduced use of cullet.

Construction uses of cullet has been sporadic. Glasphalt and roadbase projects were undertaken when major earthquakes created significant plate glass at low prices.

Construction use of recycled glass could provide an almost unlimited demand for cullet that would far exceed supply. In California, as long as cullet prices remain 6 to 10 times higher than sand and aggregate rock used in glasphalt and roadbase, significant amounts of cullet will not find its way into roadbeds.

Higher-valued products such as glass tile, dishes, picture frames, or high end bowls and other glassware, offer limited markets for cullet. However, as these products represent only a small part of the dishware and decorative market, only a few tons of cullet per year will be used.

Projected Demand for Cullet

Assuming that the minimum-content requirements for containers and fiberglass will not be changed in the next two to three years, the production rates of glass food and beverage container and the fiberglass industry will continue to have the major influence on the demand for California container cullet.

The industry consolidation has reduced the number of glass plants in California and some of the remaining glass plants have parent company ownership from Mexico (Anchor & Latchford) and France (Ball Incon & Foster Forbes-American/National). New plants have opened in Mexico and will represent new competition for glass bottle sales in the California glass manufacturing industry.

The national projected growth rates (production) of glass containers for the next couple of years is thought to be flat or declining. California will more than likely follow the national trend. If this is the case, the demand for cullet could remain relatively flat or lessen.

Projected fiberglass production rates will also affect cullet use. Nationally, fiberglass production was off in 1995 due to slow construction starts. Nationally, fiberglass production in 1996 is not expected to be a banner year either. If housing starts increase (partly determined by interest rates), fiberglass production could increase. Also, the extent to which California fiberglass producers export their product overseas is unknown, but may have a positive impact on cullet use.

Primary Barriers to Material Supply/Demand

Glass Beneficiation Industry

Quality concerns are one of the primary barriers to increasing the amount of glass beneficiated in California.

Glass beneficiators had seen an improvement in the quality of cullet received from recyclers and processors as the glass recycling infrastructure was being built. Further improvements in the quality of cullet have not been made in the last couple of years. Glass received by beneficiation facilities may, in fact, be getting dirtier. Some experts attribute the degradation of cullet to the emergence of dirty material recovery facilities (MRFs).

Glass beneficiation facilities are continuing to have problems with contaminants in cullet. Refractory material, such as ceramics, stone, brick, asphalt, stucco, and heat resistant material (e.g., ovenware), continue to be found in the feedstock brought to beneficiation facilities. The technology used by Gallo will, generally speaking, allow more contamination in cullet. However, this technology has limits on the amount of contamination it can tolerate, and requires more energy to process cullet than conventional beneficiation facilities.

Glass beneficiation facilities are caught between a feedstock that is becoming dirtier and more stringent standards required by glass container and fiberglass manufacturers. In an effort to control maintenance and production equipment costs, glass container and fiberglass manufacturers are requiring cleaner cullet. (Contaminated cullet reduces the life expectancy and increases the operating costs of glass container and fiberglass production equipment).

Medical waste continues to invade cullet received by beneficiation facilities. Medical waste in the form of syringes, glass vials, and pharmaceutical glass pose very serious problems for beneficiators. For example, vials and tubes containing fluid are broken during processing and their contents may infect or injure workers. Medical waste cannot be tolerated in container cullet. Beneficiators are now rejecting loads of glass that contain any medical waste.

Glass Container Manufacturing Industry

The relatively high price of cullet in California, the trend away from color-separating glass, and the fact that many glass container manufacturers also make other kinds of containers are the major barriers to expansion of cullet use in California.

The glass container manufacturing industry maintains that in California the cost of cullet to container manufacturers is higher than in 47 other states. In those states, the cost of using cullet approximates the cost of using virgin (batch) materials. Whereas in California cullet is more expensive than virgin materials. With a decreasing container market share, California container manufacturers are hard pressed to pass along any increase in production costs (higher cullet prices) to their customers. The container manufacturing industry ascribes the higher cost of cullet to the processing fee (AB 2020).

California container manufacturers used 600,000 to 700,000 tons of cullet in 1995. If the price of cullet approximated the cost of cullet in other states, the glass container industry asserts that California container producers could double the amount of cullet used.

Color Separation

Less glass is being color separated by recyclers and consequently less color separated material is available to container manufactures. The trend in glass recycling is to mix brown, green, and clear glass food, drink, and beverage containers, producing what the industry calls three-color mix. About twice as much three-color mix is collected today compared to two years ago. The increase in three-color mix may be the combined result of:

• The fiberglass industry's increased demand for three-color.
• The operation of more dirty MRFs by jurisdictions.
• The increase in demand for three-color by one large vertically integrated wine producer.
• The State's AB 2020 monetary incentive for recyclers to focus on cullet volume rather than cullet quality.

Horizontal Integration

Most all of the California glass container manufacturers are horizontally integrated, producing plastic and metal containers as well. Because they have the flexibility to produce non glass containers, the "glass industry" may not be as inclined to promote the use of glass containers, knowing that any glass market share loss will be gained by the other container types they also produce.

Fiberglass Manufacturing Industry

The scrap glass that has ceramic or stone contamination cannot be used by the fiberglass industry even if the glass is pulverized. Their smaller furnaces cannot sufficiently melt all of the contaminants. To manufacture fiberglass, molten glass is spun to form glass fibers. The design of the fiberglass plant's spinning operation cannot tolerate even very small contaminants.

Strategies to Overcome Barriers

Glass Beneficiation Industry

One possible means to overcome the quality barriers affecting the glass beneficiation industry (which in turn affects the ability of the glass container and fiberglass manufacturing industry to use more glass) is for the Board, working with the local jurisdictions, to undertake a public education program to educate/remind recyclers, haulers, and jurisdictions that they share in the responsibility to provide as clean a product to beneficiators as economically possible.

Another way to boost the supply of cullet is to increase the number of households participating in glass recycling in California. This could be accomplished through additional education efforts by jurisdictions and the Board aimed at providing more information to households on the benefits of glass recycling.

Glass Container Manufacturing Industry

The container manufacturing industry in California maintains that the higher price of cullet vis-à-vis other states and the trend to three-color mix are by-and-large a product of AB 2020.

The Board should consider two actions to assist DOC in collecting more glass:

1. The Board could support DOC to expand the number and type of glass containers included under the deposit program. This could increase the quantity of glass containers diverted from landfills.
2. The Board could assist DOC to educate the public on the philosophy and rationale for the glass processing fee that is ultimately paid for by glass container manufacturers in the state. The philosophy is that each of the four material types (glass, plastic, aluminum, and bi-metal) should be recycled based on the "market economics" of each material. For example, recyclers should not have to depend on making enough money on aluminum recycling to subsidize glass recycling. The processing fee helps insure that the market for glass recycling in California is viable and that glass recyclers do not lose money recycling glass containers in California.

III. Plate Glass

Plate glass cullet is being used as feedstock in fiberglass manufacture and plate glass manufacture itself. Using plate glass cullet requires less energy than using virgin materials. Unlike other recyclable commodities, limited data is available for plate glass cullet.

Plate glass includes all types of glass produced in a flat form. Technically, according to the Glass Association of North America, "float glass" is the correct term since "plate glass" refers to a specific glass process. Most plate glass is used for windows in buildings and automobiles.

Staff did not find any data on the amount of scrap plate glass generated in California. The source reduction and recycling elements (SRRE) submitted by local jurisdictions cover generation amounts of scrap container glasses and other nonrecyclable glass but do not specifically categorize scrap plate or automotive glass.

Supply of Plate Glass Cullet

There is no data available to estimate the available supply of scrap plate glass. Industry experts indicate demand for plate glass scrap will grow by 3-4 percent during 1996. This demand should be sufficient to make use of available supply.

Listed below are the primary factors that affect plate glass cullet supply.

Economy (Housing). Supply of cullet depends largely on the amount of plate glass being processed or fabricated as windows or other glass panels for buildings.

Collection. The collection system also plays a big role on how much of the scrap plate glass goes to beneficiation facilities. Beneficiation facilities usually provide dumpsters to plate glass fabricators for their discarded plate glass.

Transportation. Glass beneficiation facilities may not find it economically feasible to collect scrap plate glass from distant generators because of transportation costs. Except for possibly window manufacturers, large generators of scrap plate glass do not exist so feasible volumes must be collected from many small generators.

Quality (Equipment). Because of the stringent quality requirements of users of plate glass cullet, the availability of the equipment to process the scrap plate glass to produce a good quality cullet is an important factor that will affect cullet supply. Depending on the degree of contamination (e.g., ceramics, glass other than plate), a beneficiation facility may not accept contaminated scrap plate glass, resulting in the disposal of what could have been an addition to the processed cullet supply inventory available for plate glass manufacturing.

Demand for California Plate Glass Cullet

Plate glass cullet demand is strongly dependent on the demand for plate glass and fiberglass insulation. Factors affecting demand for plate glass are housing starts (which depends largely on interest rates) and automobile sales. Increased construction activities result in a higher demand for plate glass and fiberglass insulation materials. With an increase in housing, manufacturers will need more cullet as feedstock for their plate glass or fiberglass manufacturing processes.

Demand for plate glass is predicted to be up 3-4 percent during 1996 due to a projected increase in housing starts. Nonresidential construction will also contribute to the projected flat glass demand increase. Automotive glass is also expected to have a healthy growth. (Glass Industry, Vol. 77, No.1, Jan. 1996).

Primary Barriers to Material Supply/Demand

Although fiberglass manufacturing facilities would prefer using plate glass cullet rather than container glass cullet, the availability of plate glass cullet is inconsistent and maintaining an inventory will increase price. Although the quality of the plate glass cullet is better than container glass cullet, fiberglass facilities are still concerned with the amount of dust present on delivered glass cullet (plate and container).

Processed cullet deliveries are sometimes rejected by manufacturers because of contamination. This makes the beneficiation facilities very selective and strict on accepting plate glass for processing. Generators must therefore be careful to eliminate contaminants as they collect plate glass.

Transportation costs are often a barrier to supply and demand of plate glass cullet. The distance between beneficiation facilities that process plate cullet and end users affect transportation costs and therefore the price of the material.

Strategies to Overcome Barriers

The barriers mentioned above are all industry-dependent. The Board should develop and disseminate information on practices which avoid contamination of the scrap plate glass for processing. Once these practices are identified, case studies can be prepared and disseminated to the glass fabrication industry.

Since most of the scrap plate glass comes from window fabricators, other potential sources need to be tapped. Staff should investigate the feasibility of collecting plate glass from demolition sites.

IV. Summary

Identified below are the major barriers which impede recycling of container cullet:

Glass Beneficiation Industry

Glass beneficiation facilities are continuing to have problems with contaminants in cullet. Refractory material, such as ceramics, stone, brick, asphalt, stucco and heat resistant material (e.g., ovenware), continue to be found in the feedstock brought to beneficiation facilities.

Medical waste continues to invade cullet received by beneficiation facilities. Medical waste in the form of syringes, glass vials, and pharmaceutical glass pose very serious problems for beneficiators.

Glass Container Manufacturing Industry

The relatively high price of cullet in California and the trend away from color separation of cullet affect the amount of cullet used by glass container manufacturers.

Fiberglass Manufacturing Industry

Contamination from ceramics or stone cannot be used by the fiberglass industry even if the glass is pulverized. Their smaller furnaces cannot sufficiently melt these and other contaminants.

Staff Strategies to Improve Cullet Recycling

The Board, working with the local jurisdictions, should undertake a public education program to educate/remind recyclers, haulers, and jurisdictions that they share in the responsibility to provide as clean a product to beneficiators as economically possible.

The Board, to increase the number of households participating in glass recycling, could work with local jurisdictions to provide additional information/education to households on the benefits of glass recycling.

The Board could support DOC to expand the number and type of glass containers included under the deposit program. This could increase the quantity of glass containers diverted from landfills.

The Board could assist DOC to educate the public on the philosophy and rationale for the glass processing fee that is ultimately paid for by glass container manufacturers in the State.

1996 Market Development Plan

Last updated: November 01, 2007