I have heard something very interesting about recycling of wine bottles in Denmark. Wine bottles do not have the pant on them (at least majority of the bottles) and therefore one should deliver them to these big round containers on the street. Fair enough - one should think - it is not so important to get money for the bottle, but to deliver them, so they would be reused again. And if it happens that some of them break, it would be melted and made into new bottles.
Actually only 21% of the wine bottles will be washed and put back into the cycle. Majority is melted and then made into new bottles. How come? It is because of the way the bottles are collected and transported to the sorting and washing, and because of the glue used to put the labels. The process is following:
- You put the bottle in the container - it makes a pretty strong 'clank', but probably it would not brake.
- The truck that collects the bottles, lifts the container and opens it from underneath (wonderful design :/ ), to let the bottles flow with incredibly loud clatter into the dumper.
- The truck drives to the washing/collecting center where it dumps it on the floor (there might be one extra stop, not sure). Breaking more bottles...
- In the washing, the bottles that have the labels with a strong glue, will be sent to be melted.
- And of course, some of the bottles have a shape, that is not suitable for the local needs.
I cannot give you the exact numbers, but it is very clear that instead of washing, but melting and making new bottles, the process requires much more energy. One could save a lot here..
What about the fact that wine comes from other countries than Denmark? Well, apparently, the supermarkets bottle big part of their wine, that comes in casks, in Denmark.
So, next time you have a glass of wine, you can think about how to 'break the vicious circle' and get the wine bottle safely back to the supermarkets wine department, to be used again and again and again. :)
Piret
(information collected from a discussion in our citizens Waste Group at 2100.nu)
Very important to think about it Piret!
ReplyDeleteActually, our user habits can have a considerable impact in creating more sustainable ways of living. The life cycle of such a products are very short and the energy we need to recover wine bottles for example is considerably high.
I think the civil society should work in campaigns to improve our own energy efficiency in our day by day.
Lets work on it!!
Ricardo
Such a French topic! we should definitely come back to the deposit habit (had it in the 50ies), it would be a way to spare a lot, given we are the 1st consumers in Europe (in the world???)!!!
ReplyDeleteCHEERS to that!
And what happens with the glue? It gets melted and can be in contact with the wine, therefore making it toxic?