Glass Bottle Banks Vanish

Local residents and the UK glass industry have expressed regret over the recent removal of the recycling areas for bottles in the Tonbridge Sainsbury’s car park.

The decision was taken by Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council, which says it hopes to save £100,000 a year by not having to empty the car park recycling bins.

The glass industry says bottle banks generate high quality glass, ideal for ensuring all glass gets reused for new bottles.

Shortly after the removal of the bottle banks, one frustrated West Kent resident told this reporter: “I have just come to drop off some glass and all the bins have gone. The bins were always there and useful.”

The resident said: “I think the situation is being very poorly handled.  I want to recycle the glass. I know of no other place to go – other than taking it to the tip, but that involves registering and making appointments. Just for glass – that’s pointless.”

Bottle banks remain in areas controlled by Sevenoaks District Council such as Edenbridge, Underriver and Chiddingstone.

Matthew Kay is the packaging policy lead for British Glass, which represents glass manufacturers and reprocessors. Mr Kay said: “It is a shame when “bring sites” – as they are known – are removed because they do bring in a high quality of glass recyclate”.

Matthew Kay continued: “Through various pieces of legislation that are going through from the old government, local authorities will be required to collect glass from the kerbside, so we can understand cost implications from the local authorities point of view.  However, if there are (bring) sites that are very well used, it is a shame if they can’t be maintained.”

In both Tunbridge Wells and Tonbridge, the councils emphasise that glass bottles can be placed in the mixed recycling wheelie bins collected from homes every fortnight. On the other hand, not all residents are happy with broken glass in mixed recycling bins full of plastic and foil.

Matthew Kay from the Glass industry says if glass is collected from the home it should ideally be separated from other types of recyclable materials as happens throughout Wales, where the government incentivises local authorities to improve separate recycling.

Mr Kay says: “It is absolutely amazing what has been happening in Wales. We do advocate for kerbside collection where ideally glass is collected separately from other materials.”

Cllr Dennis King from Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council said the “relatively large cost” to council tax payers of maintaining the recycling units at Sainsbury’s and other sites couldn’t be justified when glass collections were already taking place from residents’ driveways.

The council also doesn’t like the ability of some local businesses to dispose of glass at the sites, as then the local firms would pay smaller waste collection fees to the council.

More than 20% of glass collected by the Tonbridge and Malling council in the kerbside mixed recycling is currently not in a state that it can be separated out from other waste. So that glass is used in concrete blocks and lost to the glass industry.

That’s a problem as making new glass from raw materials (rather than reusing old glass) is much more energy intensive and releases carbon into the atmosphere.

The ideal is a fully closed loop whereby 100% of used glass is constantly recycled as new bottles. The new arrangements in Tonbridge seem unlikely to help with progress towards that goal.