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London glass project looks to secure material

A glass recycling organisation is expanding as a result of a London Remade grant, but ensuring a consistent supply of post consumer waste glass remains a challenge.

Recycling group, The Green Bottle Unit has was set up by the Free Form Arts Trust and recycles glass into tiles, bricks and paviours for use in public art projects, building projects, urban regeneration schemes, landscaped gardens and street paving. The unit has worked with local authorities and developers, who want alternatives to traditional building materials. And, most recently, recycled glass paviours fitted with fibre optics have been included in landscaping in Reading town centre.

Martin Goodrich, unit director, told letsrecycle.com, that following a successful 18-month trial, the trust has now secured funding for a three-year research, development and production programme. The project has received funding from a number of organisations including London Remade which has given the organisation a capital grant which has enabled it to buy new kilns and other equipment to expand its business.

Mr Goodrich explained how the first part of the organisation's work concentrated on whether it is feasible to market products made from recycled glass. And he said that this was proven by the “staggering” response they have so far received.

Mr Goodrich said one of its first projects was carried out in partnership with London Remade when they spent six months developing glass tiles made from television glass for the Greater London Assembly's new building, but that in the end the GLA's designer decided against using the tiles. This is now in the past and Mr Goodrich said: “From April 1 we will be starting on a three year research development and production project. The work will look at the best way of producing products made from recycled glass and will also look at opening up glass new markets such as examining possible markets for tiles made from using interior tiles for kitchens and bathrooms.”

The organisation hopes to build on its existing partnerships with commercial glass producers and retailers with a view to expanding the volume of recycled glass it uses. But this causes problems for the Glass Bottle Unit. Mr Goodrich said that the research and development project will look at how they can secure a better supply of glass that will be suitable for their increasing needs. He explained how they want to increase production but said: “As soon as we use high volumes of glass we don't make very nice products from the glass we receive. Can you get a consistent supply of glass to mass-produce the product?” And this problem needs to be addressed as the tiles need to be mass-produced to decrease the cost.

Pizza

The unit currently carefully selects the glass it uses and recycles a small amount of glass which it collects from some Pizza Express restaurants in London and the Young Vic Theatre. These have been hand-chosen as a result of the colours of bottles that are sold there and the organisation picks these up free of charge. The Green Bottle Unit also buys glass from a glass processor. The unit runs a small-scale studio where glass is sorted and crushed before being re-worked as hand made kiln fired objects. The organisation is also working with glass which is more difficult to process such as TV and VDU screens, fluorescent tubes, car windows and float glass.

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