Tue, Sep 06, 2016 page3

• The artists making new work from recycled glass

  CUTTING EDGE: Chiu Ta-chan, an artist who works with recycled glass, said that he enjoys making both flat and three-dimensional Taiwan-themed pieces

  • By Yang Mien-chieh and William Hetherington / Staff reporter, with staff writer
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  With the amount of recycled glass bottles thrown away increasing every year, businesses are finding ways to put the recovered material to uses that go beyond making new bottles.

  Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) statistics show that the nation recycles 227,000 tonnes of glass bottles each year — the equivalent of 450 million 600cc bottles.

  Once the bottles arrive at the recycling plant, they must be separated according to glass type and color, have labels and other unwanted materials removed, smashed and then washed before the glass can be used again.

  

  An ornamental wall light, made out of wood and recycled beer bottles to form the shape of Taiwan, is pictured alongside a decorative lamp on Aug 2 in Taipei.

  Photo: Yang Mien-Chieh, Taipei Times

  Once the glass is put into the hands of skilled artists, they devise new ideas to turn the material back into everyday goods.

  This process reduces dependency on resource extraction and fuels the “green” economy.

  “Bottles are separated into single color and mixed-color glass. Of the 227,000 tonnes of glass we receive every year, only about 20 percent is mixed-color glass. The reason is that mixed-color glass is comparatively more difficult to separate and work with. However, the EPA is working with businesspeople to use multi-colored glass in floor tiles. This will significantly improve recycle rates,” a member of the EPA’s Resource Recycling Fund Management Committee said.

  Chiu Ta-chan (邱大展), an artist who works with glass, said he enjoys making both flat and three-dimensional Taiwan-themed pieces.

  Some of Chiu’s well-received works include an ornamental lamp featuring an outline of Taiwan and a Taiwan-shaped paperweight.

  Chiu said he has been looking at new uses for recycled glass and has used granulated glass in gardening, adding that he hopes to widen the potential applications of the material by combining artistic and functional elements.

  The committee hopes that artists like Chiu will show the public that recycled glass has uses beyond making new bottles, such as creating products that are useful in everyday life.

  The committee said that even large-scale uses of recycled glass are possible, citing the glass path at the Olympic Stadium in London, glass balconies at Dubai restaurants and on the outer wall of Sinshe Elementary School in Hsinchu County’s Jhubei City (竹北), which is embedded with glass tiles imprinted with children’s drawings.
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