Emhart Glass has announced that it is working to develop a new technology for manufacturing toughened packaging glass. The process will be commercialised under industrial production conditions in collaboration with Vetropack and represents a "milestone" for stronger and lighter weight glass containers, the companies report. For over 80 years, flat glass has been toughened for use as safety glass. According to Emhart, it is the world's first producer of glass container manufacturing equipment to have succeeded in giving packaging glass the properties of toughened flat glass. The patented toughened glass technology is being developed on the in-house glass production line at the Emhart Glass Research Centre in the USA. The process allows either a significant increase in resistance to breakage or a reduction in the weight of packaging glass. In practice, both these properties will be combined as required. The process is expected to reduce the weight of returnable bottles, while maintaining the same filling capacity. When tested by dropping onto a hard surface from a height of 1.5 metres, only very few filled bottles break, while conventional ones generally shatter. Toughened glass containers can be recycled like ordinary packaged glass.
