Hollow glass products - Shards

Four types of glass products are created in the hollow glass waste chain:

The first three arise from separate collection. The last one is a mixture of the various colours, whereby the glass is not collected separately.

In the processing stage, the glass material is reduced to 40 millimetres or smaller. Then, with the help of optical separators, the glass shard is examined and sorted. A piece of stone, for example, is recognised and, after detection, is shot precisely with an air pulse into a collection box. The surrounding glass shards continue the process. The various treatment steps of glass ensure that the particles become smaller and smaller. This creates particles that can no longer be "seen" by optical methods. These particles are sieved off and used to make glass powder.

The two hollow glass recycling plants in the Netherlands, located in Heijningen and Emmen, can take all the above types of glass and reprocess them to the desired purity. The colour distribution can vary from one collection station to another. Adjustments are made before or during the sorting process.

Hollow glass products - Powder

Small glass particles can no longer be cleaned properly. This fraction is ideally suited for making fine powder with dimensions smaller than one millimetre. And this glass powder can also be used in glass furnaces.

The different types:

In the final product, a maximum of 25 grams per metric ton of ceramic, stone or porcelain, 100 grams per metric ton of plastic and a few grams per metric ton of concentrations of iron, aluminium and other residual metals may be present.