In 2025, glass recycling made its return to the Flathead Valley. Black Bear Recycling is a curbside service that offers an option for recycling glass and a variety of other household items.
Black Bear processes the material on site in a glass pulverizer. The product of the pulverizer is sand or gravel, which can be used in construction materials or for household purposes. Recycled sand and gravel is available for purchase on Black Bear’s website.
In their successful opening year, Black Bear diverted over 20,000 pounds of glass from Flathead County’s landfill.
The most recent data from the EPA on glass recycling in the United States was published in 2018. Their data shows that glass recycling has stagnated in the United States since its peak in 2015 at about 31%. A section of the EPA’s National Recycling Strategy aims to increase glass recycling to 50% by 2030. With the lack of verified recycling data from the EPA, we cannot determine if substantial progress has been made toward the goal.
Glass recycling is a vital piece of the United States’ recycling efforts. With the correct infrastructure in place, glass can be recycled in an area, and redistributed to that same area. Black Bear Recycling does just that in the Flathead Valley, pulverizing the glass, and redistributing across the valley. We thank the team at Black Bear for their efforts. For more information, click here.