Beach Maintenance, Beach Nourishment, Beach Nourishment, Week in Review

“Recycling” Glass Back to Sand … For Beaches?

climate change, glass recycling, sand supply reduction

Gary Griggs | 26 March 2023

CoastalCare.org has been a leader in reporting on the global impacts of beach sand mining and its negative impact on shorelines. The Santa Aquila Foundation was an important supporter of the awarding-winning film Sand Wars, which was an engaging and behind-the-scenes investigation of this global issue. Vanishing Sands written by Orrin Pilkey, Norma Longo, William Neal, Nelson Rangel-Buitrago, Keith Pilkey, and Hannah Hayes was just published and is as comprehensive a look at beach and river sand mining around the planet.

There have been several recent proposals and some projects actually underway to grind up glass bottles and use this ground glass to replenish beaches. Along most shorelines, other than in tropical environments, the dominant mineral making up the beach sand is quartz, which is silicon dioxide (SiO2), the same elemental composition as glass. While this may initially seem like a good solution for replenishing or nourishing disappearing or narrow beaches, this concept is not a sustainable or effective approach.

Initially derived from silica sand glass is a valuable resource that is already in a pure form that can most effectively be recycled or melted down to make more glass, rather than being put on the beach where it will be lost to the ocean over time as it is carried offshore or alongshore.

The posts highlighted below describe the development of Glass Half Full, a small glass crushing/grinding facility in Louisiana that was conceived of as a way to replenish a retreating shoreline. One catalyst for this effort was the lack of glass bottle recycling facilities in this part of Louisiana. The article states that the college students who initially created this facility have now expanded their efforts to grind up 150,000 pounds of glass each month, which amounts to 75 tons. A cubic yard of sand (or glass) weighs about 1.35 tons, so this 75 tons/month is equal to 55.5 cubic yards, about 5 dump truck loads. With beach nourishment projects typically involving tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of cubic yards of sand, this very modest amount of glass sand is simply not significant.

Glass Half Full is a creative and innovative company that deserves to be celebrated. All things considered, however, in the big big picture, this same glass could be more effectively recycled and reused as glass products, thereby negating the need to mine even more sand to create new glass products.

(Photo above: Glass Bottles (by Ballookey Klugeypop CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 via Flickr).

Restoring Louisiana’s Shoreline, One Glass Bottle at a Time – GIZMODO

Aerial view of Avon Beach, from Dare County 2026 Beach Nourishment Project video via Youtube, March 10, 2026.

Excerpt:

For years, Dare County has relied on a relatively predictable formula to manage its changing oceanfront: invest local tourism dollars into shoreline protection efforts, and depend on federal support to help sustain those projects and recover from storms.

In 2026, that formula is showing signs of strain.

At the center of the uncertainty for upcoming beach nourishment projects is the Federal Emergency Management Agency — better known as FEMA — where policy changes, funding delays, and broader federal debates about disaster response are creating unknowns for coastal communities nationwide, including those on the Outer Banks.

Local officials say the biggest issue is not whether FEMA funding exists, but whether it will arrive in time — or in the same form as it has in the past.

A quick background on Dare County’s beach nourishment funding model

Dare County’s beach nourishment efforts are primarily funded through a locally controlled revenue stream: two percent of the county’s six percent occupancy tax, which is paid by visitors staying in vacation rentals, hotels, and other accommodations, coupled with smaller amounts provided by specially created tax districts. (On Hatteras Island, those tax districts include Avon and a portion of Buxton.)

That funding source has allowed the county to invest heavily in shoreline management. According to Dare County Board of Commissioners Chairman Bob Woodard, the county will have spent more than $300 million on nourishment projects once the next Buxton project is complete in 2026.

But local dollars are only part of the equation.

Once a beach has been “engineered” through nourishment, it becomes eligible for FEMA’s Public Assistance funding following storm-related erosion. That federal program, which typically covers a significant share of disaster recovery costs, is critical to maintaining projects over time.

Under FEMA’s Public Assistance framework, the federal government generally reimburses a large share of eligible disaster recovery costs, including infrastructure and shoreline repairs.

That reimbursement model has historically made large-scale nourishment financially viable, or at the very least, has allowed Dare County to pursue larger beach nourishment projects that are likely to last a bit longer.

For example, the importance of FEMA funding was evident during Buxton’s 2022 maintenance beach nourishment project. According to prior reporting, the agency reimbursed $4,337,149 for the placement of 303,732 cubic yards of sand along nearly three miles of beach.

That federal contribution certainly did not fund the entire project, but it significantly reduced the local financial burden and reinforced a model where local investment is paired with federal recovery support.

Without that partnership, maintaining engineered beaches naturally becomes more difficult.

In January 2025, Dare County submitted a request for FEMA funding tied to storm-related erosion, a routine step following past nourishment cycles.

More than a year later, county officials are still waiting for a definitive response.

“We have not heard back from FEMA, which is making us a little nervous,” Woodard said during his March 2026 State of the County presentation.

The lack of clarity is already influencing local planning.

According to Assistant Dare County Manager Dustin Peele, FEMA reimbursement could determine the overall size and timeline of the upcoming Avon and Buxton nourishment projects.

If funding is approved, the county can place a larger volume of sand along both shorelines. If not, the projects will still move forward, but with a smaller footprint.

If the worst-case scenario occurs and no FEMA funds arrive in time for the summer of 2026 nourishment projects, it’s not the end of the cycle, or the end of the world.

Instead, the next maintenance nourishment projects, which are typically scheduled every five years, may be pushed up to two or three years from now, depending on how 2026’s projects fare…