A Circular Economy Act to support flat glass closed-loop recycling systems

Supporting the flat glass sector to enable sustainable transformations in advanced materials

Flat glass products are essential to Europe’s efforts to reduce carbon emissions, helping to save energy in buildings, supporting the transition to clean mobility and contributing to the efficient generation of renewable solar energy. In all its applications, flat glass is an irreplaceable material whose technological advances, availability and affordability are critical to Europe’s fulfilling its energy and climate ambitions.

Yet end-of-life glazing is rarely properly dismantled from buildings and cars, which prevents its effective recycling. Only 5% of end-of-life construction and demolition building glass is effectively recycled today.

The closed loop recycling of flat glass diverts waste from landfill, allows savings on raw materials and is also one of the most prominent ways to reduce energy consumption and CO₂ emissions from glass manufacturing.

The flat glass industry is eager to use more recycled glass into its manufacturing process, its ability to scale up is slowed down by several regulatory bottlenecks and a policy framework not conducive enough to circularity in glazing.

The forthcoming Circular Economy Act must therefore address the existing bottlenecks to create an efficient market for secondary raw materials and turn waste into resources.

Flat glass recycling potential

The challenges faced by sector

Lack of incentives: The flat glass industry suffers from a lack of obligations to properly dismantle and sort windows and glazing from buildings as well as automotive glass parts from vehicles. Dismantling glass parts at the end-of-life is nevertheless a crucial starting point to increase the availability of high quality cullet.
Regulatory Barriers: Legislations or in some cases the lack thereof hampers the collection and transport of cullet throughout the European Union. It is for instance the case for pre-consumer glass which is not recognised by many Member States as a “by-product” in spite of all the EU definition criteria being met.

Our Recommendations for the Circular Economy Act

Recycling flat glass is the most beneficial end-of-life option for both architectural and automotive glass. The following measures will contribute to accelerating the implementation of closed-loop systems to reduce raw materials and energy use in flat glass manufacturing:

Support the dismantling and sorting of end-of-life glazing

Set a mandatory recycling target for flat glass in the Waste Framework Directive alongside the general 70% target on construction and demolition waste. This possibility is foreseen in article 11(6) of the WFD
Strengthen provisions for mandatory pre-demolition audits, including recommendations for sorting and recycling by type of glass
Confirm the provision on mandatory glass dismantling before vehicle shredding, as part of the proposal for the End-of-Life of Vehicles (ELV) Regulation

Facilitate the collection and transport of end-of-life flat glass

Recognise the status of ‘by-product’ for pre-consumer cullet (waste or broken glass) either via a revision of the Waste Framework Directive or the development of by-products harmonized criteria applicable throughout the EU
Strengthen the Landfill Directive to implement a progressive ban on landfilling of recyclable flat glass products

Create lead markets for circular flat glass products

Review of the definition of recycling in the Circular Economy Act to remove backfilling from the definition and introduce priority to high-quality closed-loop recycling
Review the Taxonomy criteria on circularity in construction to define more realistic criteria on the use of secondary materials for the production of construction materials
Align criteria with other initiatives aimed at promoting the use of low-carbon and circular products, for example Green Public Procurement or future obligations stemming from the Construction Products Regulation to ensure consistency and provide a clear direction to industry
Develop a whole-life carbon methodology for construction products and buildings at the European level