Though there may be times when a windshield glass replacement is necessary, 90% of the time, a windshield chip repair will serve the purpose just as well.
~Glass takes more than 1 million years to decompose in our landfills.
California Department of Conservation
~Most windshields are not recycled . About ten percent of our landfills are made up of glass.
~Energy needed to produce one windshield is equal to 10,000 repairs.
~88% of windshields that have been replaced could have easily been fixed instead of being
discarded.
~Nationally, 11 million windshields are replaced annually. At an average weight of 25 pounds
each, this equates to about 275 million pounds of waste per year.
The Boston Globe
~Scientific analysis of energy cost for producing glass: with a 20 percent increase in
glass repair instead of replacement worldwide, carbon emissions would be reduced by 57
million metric tons.
~The transportation of glass, which is a relatively heavy product, throughout the supply chain
results in high levels of transport-related CO2 emissions.
Advances in Glasses and Glass-Ceramics, Frost & Sullivan, 2006
~Glass manufacturing is a high-temperature, energy-intensive activity, resulting in the emission
of combustion by-products (sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide, and nitrogen oxides) and the
high-temperature oxidation of atmospheric nitrogen.
Environmental, Health, and Safety Guidelines for Glass Manufacturing, World Bank Group
~Windshield glass is difficult to recycle because much of the glass is 2-ply laminated and
contains a PVB layer that must be separated. Integrated heating elements or radio antenna
are often embedded within the windshields and cannot be returned to the glass furnace for
reworking. British Glass, Glass Manufacture: A Mass Balance Study, 2005
~It takes 15.2 million BTUs of energy to produce one ton of glass. The manufacturing of one
ton of glass can generate as much as 385 pounds of mining waste and 28 pounds of air
pollutants. Like the production of other materials, glass manufacturing and usage has
negative impacts on the environment. The Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation
