Waverley Council completed construction today on a 100m road pavement using recycled crushed glass in the concrete surface, the second site in the Bondi area to use recycled crushed glass (RCG) in roads.

The project is a partnership between Waverley Council, the Australian Food and Grocery Council's Packaging Stewardship Forum (PSF), the Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water NSW (DECCW), the Roads and Traffic Authority NSW (RTA) and the Roads & Transport Directorate of the Institute of Public Works Engineering Australia (IPWEA) which has seen the construction of two local Bondi roads using 83 tonnes of recycled crushed glass, equivalent to more than 460,000 stubbies.

The two demonstration sites, located half a kilometre away from the sands of Bondi Beach, have used RCG as a substitute for virgin quarried sand in asphalt and concrete road surfaces. The glass in asphalt road was laid in June 2010 in Blair Street, Bondi and the glass in concrete road is in O'Brien Street, Bondi.

The Mayor of Waverley, Councillor Sally Betts, said "Waverley Council is pleased to be a party to this important recycling initiative. The recycled glass trial in the bitumen sections of road in Blair Street are working very well and clearly demonstrate the practical use of recycled crushed glass in bitumen road pavements. This new section of road in O'Brien Street is in a concrete road and, once again, Waverley Council is confident that the use of recycled crushed glass in this pavement will be successful."

PSF General Manager, Jenny Pickles said Waverley Council's decision to use RCG was part of a nationwide catalyst for change towards RCG use in civil construction projects, which provides one of the most significant opportunities to boost glass recycling rates nationally.

"Through our kerbside recycling systems we're collecting more than 76% of glass beverage containers annually but due to breakage almost 50% of this collected glass cannot be recycled back into new glass containers. That means around 120,000 tonnes nationally is either stockpiled or going to waste in our landfills annually," said Ms Pickles.

"The road construction sector uses millions of tonnes of sand and aggregate each year. By using RCG as a replacement for sand, we could reduce the mining of virgin sand, eliminate current glass waste, save landfill space and provide ongoing local markets for the glass we collect through kerbside. Momentum is now building in New South Wales and other states as councils and their construction contractors see the benefit of using recycled materials in civil engineering projects," Ms Pickles said.

Through partnerships between the PSF, government and industry there are already several sites nationally that are demonstrating that using recycled crushed glass in roads and pavements provides a cost effective local solution for dealing with recovered glass containers. These projects are already addressing 10% of the annual glass stockpile.

Demonstration sites that have been completed or are currently under construction include Great Lakes Council in NSW, Augusta-Margaret River Shire Council in Western Australia, Brimbank and Manningham Councils in Victoria and Clarence Council in Tasmania.