Following recent conversations in the industry about moving on from glass, Fiacre O’Donnell, sustainability director at Encirc, defends the material and its sustainability credentials…
Glass is evolving, as it has always done. Recent commentary has called for the wine industry to “move on” from glass, citing concerns about energy intensity, weight and the rise of alternative packaging formats such as cans, rPET, and bag-in-box (BIB). These points merit discussion, but they overlook a crucial fact: glass is not standing still.
Glass is changing. It’s becoming lighter, cleaner and as low carbon as any other material. But as a new global conversation emerges around health and safety in packaging, it’s increasingly clear that glass isn’t just sustainable, it’s the healthiest and most future-proof packaging choice we have.
The Lancet Countdown on Health and Plastics report, published in August 2025, describes plastics as a “grave and growing danger” to human and planetary health, responsible for economic losses of over $1.5 trillion every year. The report said less than 10% of plastics are ever recycled, and microplastic particles are now found in blood, breastmilk, lungs, liver, placenta and even the brain causing “disease and death from infancy to old age”.
The problem with plastic has moved beyond litter. It’s a health crisis. And that changes everything for packaging.
Smarter, lighter and cleaner
The idea that glass bottles are heavy and cumbersome is out of date. Modern lightweight bottles, 750ml wine bottles now available weighing as little as 300g, are now commonplace resulting in huge carbon savings without compromising aesthetics or performance.
Crucially, glass isn’t just recyclable, it’s infinitely recyclable. Every bottle can become another bottle, again and again, with no loss of quality. This circularity is what truly differentiates glass from its alternatives. Where plastics degrade, and multi-material formats complicate recycling, glass provides a fully closed loop with no compromises.
When you combine a lightweight bottle with hydrogen or biofuel energy, and a high proportion of recycled cullet, the carbon footprint of glass becomes negligible – especially when compared with the full lifecycle of alternative materials.
The Lancet Countdown highlights more than 16,000 chemicals present in plastics, including bisphenols, phthalates and PFAS, many of which are linked to infertility, cancer, cardiovascular disease and developmental disorders. Alarmingly, these chemicals are found in nearly all humans tested. In fact, China has yet to approve rPET for food-contact use due to ongoing concerns over potential chemical migration into food and drink.
Glass, by contrast, is chemically inert. It never leaches, reacts, or absorbs flavours. For consumers who care not just about sustainability but about what’s entering their bodies, that matters enormously
Conveying meaning
For wine, packaging is more than a vessel, it’s part of the experience. When it comes to preserving the integrity, flavour and aroma of the wine inside, glass remains unmatched. Cans rely on polymer linings to protect the metal from the wine, effectively meaning you’re drinking out a plastic bag! Bag in box systems likewise.
Even with improved technology, are such packaging options suitable for wines that benefit from aging or longer-term storage – or for those wanting to keep clear of chemical leaching?
Glass, however, offers perfect taste neutrality and airtight preservation. It allows wines to evolve naturally, age gracefully, and maintain their character over time. For premium drinks this is not a minor detail; it’s fundamental to glass’s identity.
The perception of glass is also inseparable from wine’s image of quality, authenticity and trust. Consumers associate glass with care, tradition and craftsmanship and more importantly, safety. With health fast becoming the next frontier of sustainability, brands using glass are perfectly positioned to lead this new chapter.
A hot prospect
It’s true that traditional glass production is energy intensive. Furnaces run continuously at around 1,500°C, and this energy demand has historically been met by natural gas. But the sector is undergoing a quiet revolution. Across Europe, glass manufacturers are investing heavily in hydrogen and biofuel technologies to decarbonise their operations.
Hydrogen, when produced using renewable energy, can power furnaces almost entirely carbon-free. Several large-scale trials are already proving this viable at commercial levels. Meanwhile, sustainably sourced biofuels are already replacing fossil gas in pilot furnaces, delivering deep emissions cuts without compromising product quality.
At Encirc, part of Vidrala group, we’re proving that sustainability and glass are the future. In 2021, we became the first in the UK to produce ultra-low-carbon bottles using biofuel, cutting emissions by up to 90% compared to traditional methods. Through our partnership with the Glass Futures and HyNet programmes, we’re leading trials for hydrogen-fuelled glass furnaces, a major step towards fully decarbonised glass manufacturing.
Couple that with increased use of cullet (recycled glass), and the picture looks even brighter. Melting cullet requires significantly less energy than raw materials, meaning every extra 10% of recycled content reduces each glass bottle’s carbon footprint by 5%.
The point is clear: the energy story of glass is changing rapidly. Abandoning the material now would mean walking away from the only material that offers a truly sustainable future for packaging.
Into the detail
The conversation around packaging sustainability must go beyond surface metrics. Lightness alone is not the same as low impact. True sustainability considers taste, health, recyclability, circularity, longevity and quality.
Rather than switching away from glass, the drinks industry should be working together with glassmakers to accelerate its transformation: investing in renewable fuels, strengthening cullet collection, and embracing smart design while maintaining its unmatched health credentials.
