The container glass industry in Europe shows the highest recycling levels within the packaging industry. Glass recycling leads to 0.25-0.30% glass furnace energy savings for each % of batch replaced by cullet. Experiences & observations from over 30 years of intensive glass recycling in Western Europe are discussed in this paper. These experiences have lead to detailed specifications or requirements of the waste glass quality to be recycled in container glass furnaces. Today, cullet is the most important raw material in this sector. The presence of metals, paper, plastics, organic substances, ceramics, stones & glass ceramics is critical & can lead to melting problems, interruption of the forming process or unacceptable glass quality. Today, most problems occur with glass ceramic contamination in cullet & variation in the so-called oxidation state of the cullet.
