ALL ABOUT GLASS By Ben, Ruby and Thomas

The raw materials of glass

The raw materials for glass is sand, lime stone and soda ash. Sand comes from the beach and grinded rock. Lime stone comes from lime stone mines and the last raw material soda ash comes from the ground and also from salt.

Many things are made out of glass. Some of these products are: jam jars, water bottles, windows, glasses, glass containers, clock covers and screens.

What products are made from glass.

How you get the raw materials of glass

A truck gathers the the sand. The lime stone mine is mined and put in carts to be taken to Melbourne. And soda ash is driven by truck.

How glass is made.

Fine sand, soda ash and lime stone is mixed in a machine to make it melt faster. Then the mixed sand, soda ash and lime stone is fired inside a furnace until it melts and it now is molten glass. The molten glass is then taken out of the furnace and molded and shaped into different glass products.

What affect does it have on the environment

It kills the habitat of some of the animals and kills the environment. By mining we destroy the habitats of animals like sea turtles, seals and crabs.

How glass is recycled.Used glass is collected from recycling bin left on the curb.

Glass is then taken to MRF (Material Recovery Facility) and separated into different materials . After materials separation at the material recovery facility glass is bulked hauled to a secondary sorting plant where it is dumped in to a hopper ready for colour separation and crushing into cullet( small pieces)

Metal contamination is removed by computerised optical sorting machines and separation into 3 main colour types of glass containers ( Green, Brown and clear). The colour of glass is determined in the original manufacture process by the addition of a various colouring agents such as chrome green) and coal( Brown ).Once the colour is added it can not be removed . There for Brown bottles can only make other Brown bottles.

Recycled glass cullet is sold to packing manufactures such as ACI for the production of new glass bottles and jars.

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