By Joseph Derr Photography by Mike Kane
After oxygen, silicon is the most prevalent naturally occurring substance in the Earth's crust. Add two parts of oxygen to one part silicon (a process that happens naturally there), and you get silicon dioxide, a core component of most rocks and sand. Heat up that sand to about 3,090 degrees, and it becomes a liquid, hardening into glass when it cools.
Though glass is derived from a naturally occurring material, once that substance is transformed into bottles, it is hardly a boon to the environment. Each year in the U.S., people throw away some 8 million tons of glass, a bulky part of landfills that can last ages. The Environmental Protection Agency reports that only about a third of glass that Americans buy gets recycled.
The Rotary Club of Chelan, Washington, found an opportunity to mine some of that glass out of the waste stream. Its 911 Glass Rescue project turns used bottles and broken glass back into sand that can be used in gardening, landscaping, playgrounds, and biological water filter projects. The club partnered with local agencies and businesses to buy a glass pulverizing machine from Andela Products. Company President and CEO Cynthia Andela is not just a glass industry expert; she also happens to be a member of the Rotary Club of Richfield Springs, New York. "I've been a Rotarian for years, and I've been selling these machines for years," says Andela. "But this Chelan club project, which unites both worlds, made me realize just how much Rotary can do."
Club members told us the story of how they make sand from unwanted glass.
