A glass recycling company is using its expertise to create innovative new products.
Taiwan’s largest glass recycling operator, Spring Pool Glass Industrial Co. in northern Taiwan’s Hsinchu City, handles 100,000 metric tons of the material each year. While the majority is processed for reuse and sold back to manufacturers, a small amount is retained by the company for use in its exclusive products.
The first of these was fire-resistant bricks made from 70 percent recycled display panel glass and 30 percent concrete. The resulting product is also lightweight and environmentally friendly.
In 2017, the company launched the W Glass Project to further develop innovative applications for recycled glass. In addition to a team of in-house craftspeople, it collaborates with artists, designers and professionals from different trades. Michelin-starred chef Andre Chiang (江振誠), for example, helped create a set of elegant tableware, and Hong Kong ceramist Niko Leung (梁康勤) has worked with the company in producing a series of home accessories.
Aaron Nieh (聶永真), one of the designers of the W Glass Project, put it best when he said, “Spring Pool has evolved from a traditional recycler into a product innovator. In other words, we’re now in the business of adding value.”
—by Jim Hwang
The company’s fire-resistant bricks are an energy-saving and environmentally friendly construction material.
Spring Pool’s craftspeople are skilled in creating a variety of everyday objects.
Glass drinking straws are just one example of how the company thinks outside the box with its recycled products.
Artworks created as part of Spring Pool’s W Glass Project