The market for recycled glass has gotten so bad that Haywood County has stopped recycling bottles, officials said.

“We pull out recyclables on the picking line but just let glass go on to the landfill,” said David Landt, recycling manager for Haywood Vocation Opportunities, the organization that handles recycling in Haywood County.

Jackson County hasn’t stopped recycling glass yet, they may not be far behind.

“Unfortunately, our glass is about to spill out into the gravel around the building. We can’t get rid of it,” said Greg Thomas, who owns County Collections in Jackson County. Country Collections handles the recyclables in Sylva and does private hauling in areas of Jackson County.

“We are considering stopping taking glass,” Thomas said. If that occurs, Thomas says he would probably quit taking it from private residences but still collect from businesses who use a lot of glass products, he said.

According to some of those in the recycling business, the current problem with glass is mostly a matter of economics.

Recyclers will pay between $35 and $10 a ton for glass, depending on market conditions, the color of the glass, and whether it is free from impurities. Most of the glass is crushed and used to make more glass.

However, gravel and sand to make glass sells for about $6 a ton from quarry operators. According to Landt, the quarry operators can make money selling gravel at that price. Recyclers who must pick up glass and transport it to companies (primarily in Charlotte and Atlanta) who buy it are losing money if they have to sell it for $35 per ton, according to Landt.

“I’ve worked for two or three years on this glass issue,” said Landt. “With the price of gravel so cheap, our secondary market is wiped out.”

Landt said Haywood County is using crushed glass around vent pipes at its landfill. The rest is being landfilled.

“It’s environmentally the least damaging of everything we recycle,” Landt said. “It is mostly sand.”

Bobby Cogdill, solid waste director for Haywood County, called collecting glass a “losing proposition.”

Citizens taking trash and recyclables to the county’s convenience centers have been informed that the county is no longer recycling glass, but Cogdill said there have only been a couple of complaints.

“No one’s really gotten upset. Some are still putting it in their blue bags, and that’s OK. We just let it go on down the line,” he said.

In addition to the low prices, Thomas said he is having difficulty collecting past due amounts from glass recyclers.

Landt said he did not anticipate any other recycled goods markets souring to the point where it was not worth it to collect the material. Steel is down also, but Landt pointed out that most packagers are cutting back on both glass and steel.

“If you’ll look in the grocery store, you’ll notice there is a lot less glass than there used to be,” he said.
Recycled materials that have strong re-sell value now include newspapers, aluminum, plastic products and cardboard.

 

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