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TOM BERRY/Ledger & Times
A glass pulverizer, on loan to the Calloway County Jail through August 14, will be used to crush tons of glass bottles donated for the cause as part of an effort by the state Division of Waste Management to keep it out of the local landfill. Above, Calloway Jailer Phil Hazle supervising inmate work crews to accomplish the job. |
Recycling glass into mulch, road filler keeps tons of refuse out of landfills
By TOM BERRY
Staff Writer
Pulverizing and reusing discarded glass as mulch, road filler and other purposes can keep tons of refuse out of city and county and landfills and save millions of dollars per year in disposal costs for communities across Kentucky.
Tom Heil, an environmental scientist with the state Division of Waste Management of the Department for Environmental Protection, says a glass pulverizer now made available to counties across the state by the department will crush waste glass so it can be mixed with mulch, concrete and other compounds; saving scarce dollars as well as ever-shrinking landfill space for everyone's benefit.
Heil said the department got approval six years ago to use pulverized glass on road beds thus saving the state money and cutting disposal costs of tons of glass every year.
“ The cost of recycling glass to be made back into bottles and jars is prohibitive - it's a loser,” Heil said. “So most of the counties have been dropping glass recycling.”
However the use of glass in other ways will pay significantly.
“It's easy tons. It's inert. So it's really a shame, maybe even foolish, to put it into municipal solid waste landfills, because it's not going to do anything there, when it has so many uses like use in roadbeds or landscape mulching. At least it is a beneficial reuse.”
The effort can save millions and millions of dollars annually.
“The average disposal cost in Kentucky is not quite $30 per ton,” Heil said. “But if we were able to capture all the glass that is disposed of in Kentucky and the EPA estimates that at about 100,000 tons, that's about $3 million.So if we could capture 30 percent of that or 30,000 tons I think that would be a really good start.”
A new machine, not yet available in Calloway County, can crush about a half-ton per hour. The machine now available at the Calloway County Jail can crush up to about 300 pounds per hour.
Grants are available for counties to gain access to the machines,which Calloway County Jailer Phil Hazle has taken advantage of and has organized volunteer inmate work crews to do the work. Hazle invites businesses, groups or individuals to donate all their discarded glass to the project.
“We'll have the machine here with us through August 14 and anybody that wants to bring their glass bottles by here to have them crushed can do so,” Hazle said.
Calloway may also work with the Regional Recycling Corporation in Eddyville to crush glass and return it to the county,” according to Heil.
“It would be a good thing to deliver the glass there, have them pulverize it, and then bring the pulverized product back to give away to residents, landscaping companies or whatever to kind of highlight or demonstrate the uses of the pulverized glass,” Heil said.
Glass bottles or items of any kind such as beer, wine, whiskey, soft drink, cups, saucers - just about any kind of glass will be accepted as long as it is clean and does not contain any foreign materials such as fabric, metal, plastic. The donation area is located on the south side of the building on Ray Coursey Jr. Drive behind the Calloway County Judicial Center. For more information, call the Calloway County Jail at 753-6150.
Story created Jul 25, 2008 - 10:54:10 EDT.
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