Cheers to that! LGA welcomes inclusion of glass wine, spirit bottles in CDS

Diverting these glass containers from kerbside bin collections will save councils and their communities around $34 million every year, based on data from the Environment Protection Authority.

LGA has advocated for this important change for many years on behalf of councils, which will help further the role product stewardship plays in economic growth and transition our state towards a more circular economy.

LGA South Australia President, Mayor Heather Holmes-Ross said recycling these bottles through the CDS is a significant win that will enable bottle-to-bottle recycling and reduce emissions through high-value resource recovery.

“This is a champagne moment for South Australia that’s worth celebrating,” Mayor Holmes-Ross said.

“As a sector, we’ve been pushing for these changes for quite some time and it’s incredibly pleasing to see the state government commit to expanding the Container Deposit Scheme to include glass wine, spirit and cordial bottles.

“We know glass collected through the CDS is cleaner and easier to recycle, which means more of these bottles can be transformed back into bottles again.

“Not only is this better for the environment, but making more high-value glass available for local manufacturers makes sense economically and it will deliver significant savings for councils and communities.”

Under the current system, glass wine, spirit and cordial bottles are collected in yellow bins as part of regular kerbside pick-ups – where they often break and contaminate other materials, like paper and cardboard, and make recycling more difficult.

Key facts to know:

• Currently, glass wine, spirit and cordial bottles represent around 22,031 tonnes of material collected from yellow co-mingled kerbside bins annually in South Australia.
• Breakage and contamination of glass in kerbside bins means around 90% of this material becomes low value cullet.
• Only 11%, or 2,523 tonnes, of this glass is recovered as high value cullet which can then be used for bottle-to-bottle recycling
• Of the 10,020 tonnes of wine and spirit glass containers currently being returned to CDS depots annually, 98% or 9,870 tonnes of this material is recovered as high value cullet.

Find out more

For media enquiries, contact  0476 853 689 or media@lga.sa.gov.au