The Bundeskartellamt has forbidden manufacturers of container glass in Germany from jointly purchasing waste glass for their production.

In the production of container glass – drink bottles, food jars, etc. - a substantial volume of waste glass is used. More than 67 per cent of the waste glass is recovered from household-oriented collections by dual systems. In 1993 German container glass manufacturers set up the glass recycling company “Gesellschaft für Glasrecycling und Abfallvermeidung (“GGA”) to jointly purchase the entire waste glass recovered from household collections. The GGA has up to now purchased the entire waste glass centrally from the waste management companies and has organized its delivery to special recycling plants. The container glass manufacturers call off quantities as required and settle the costs of reprocessing with the operators of the reprocessing plants. The GGA passes on its purchasing costs for the waste glass and its transportation to member companies, all container glass manufacturers with production sites in Germany, in the form of standard tonnage prices for the three glass colour categories white, brown and green.

This purchasing cartel prevents the container glass manufacturers’ individual demand for secondary glass materials and contravenes German and European law. Above all the Bundeskartellamt ascertained in an examination that, contrary to claims made by the member companies, the cartel is not necessary to guarantee the recycling quotas for waste glass in the long term, which for years have exceeded 80 per cent. The production of container glass has long been targeted at high utilization rates of recovered glass.

A significant increase in the proportion of primary raw material used would involve substantial investment costs. The use of waste glass as a secondary raw material brings considerable cost savings, not only because it is cheaper to purchase than primary raw materials but because its lower melting temperature leads to significant energy savings. In the view of the Bundeskartellamt there is therefore an economic incentive to replace primary raw materials to a large extent with secondary raw materials in the production of container glass.

The President of the Bundeskartellamt, Dr Heitzer, stated: „We will not allow anti-competitive cartel agreements to be made under the guise of environmental protection. This purchasing cartel leads to the elimination of competition because of its substantial share of the waste glass markets. This will make the marketing of waste glass, particularly by dual systems, more difficult meaning that possible sales proceeds cannot be passed on to the end consumer via the licensees of these systems.”

This prohibition decision does not apply to the processing of contracts concerning volumes of glass from tenders put out by “The Green Dot – Dual System Germany” (“DSD”) before 1 January 2006. These contracts end by the latest 31 December 2007.

The decision is immediately enforceable.