Building Australia’s Most Sustainable Glass Furnace with Visy

Waterline Projects and Visy Build a Sustainable Glass Furnace

Waterline’s Civil & Structural team supports Visy with bringing to life its new facility, Australia’s most sustainable glass furnace in Western Sydney. Read more…

With extensive structural design and fabrication experience, Visy Glass engaged Waterline to help bring to life Australia’s most sustainable glass furnace in Western Sydney.

We treat your projects like our own

Waterline’s Civil & Structural team has collectively more than 120 years of mining and minerals processing experience within senior engineering and drafting personnel.

Our clear and structured processes, coupled with our state-of-the-art analysis software ensures every project is geared for efficiency and optimisation from the very beginning, saving our clients time and money, maximising your return on investment. While working with a team that collaborates with you to deliver mutual success. Our proactive and transparent approach reduces your stress and maintains focus on positive project outcomes—this is why our client engage Waterline for their capital projects.

Driven to deliver mutual success, our team approaches engineering challenges as if we were the owner. This approach ensures that our solutions are technically robust and realistically implementable, focusing on cost-efficiency, effectiveness and your projects’ long-term viability. This was a main factor in encouraging Visy to work with Waterline, knowing that we would deliver positive outcomes for their business. Afterall, if our clients are successful, our people are also successful.

Visy's Sustainable Glass Furnace in Western Sydney

Visy is powering the circular economy, closing the loop between packaging, recycling, and remanufacturing.

Committed to delivering sustainable solutions that also benefit the communities in which Visy operates, Visy required a $150 million upgrade of a decommissioned furnace to create Australia’s first oxygen-fuelled furnace for its bottle making and packaging facilities.

With our extensive structural and fabrication experience, Waterline’s engineers provided structural design and fabrication outputs for several different structural components in different areas of Visy’s plant.

Areas of Work:

* Cold End Platform (500m2)
* Forming Machine Access Platforms
* HV Switch Room
* Spout Platforms
* Sampling Access Ways
* Charge Floor Access Stairs
Furnace Exhaust Ducting (Mechanical)
Engineering sign-off for furnace and feed platforms (German designed)
Deisel Tank Foundations

* Indicates steel fabrication outputs + engineering drawings

With the project now complete, the furnace will be able to produce up to 628 million bottles per year alongside a 45% reduction in energy usage compared to the previous furnace.

Our pragmatic and responsive team delivered on Visy’s requirements and we’re proud to have contributed on the delivery of this innovative and sustainable project. With the high-quality work we’ve produced, the client is engaging Waterline for further support with its other facilities.

Keen to find out how our multi-discipline team can help you deliver on your projects? Contact us now.

Photos from Visy's Sustainable Glass Furnace in Western Sydney

New 500m2 platform for accessing the new bottle elevators | Visy Penrith Manufacturing Plant

Structure to support new switchroom — New HV switchroom at Visy's Penrith Plant

Thanks team Waterline. Fantastic support and super responsive as always!

Visy

Collaborate with engineers who treat your assets like their own

Discover how Waterline’s solutions can bring precision and expertise to your engineering projects.

Give us a call on 1300 957 111

Visy's Sustainable Glass Furnace Project: Engineering Challenges and Solutions

The construction of Visy's new glass furnace in Western Sydney presented significant engineering challenges, primarily centered around achieving unprecedented levels of sustainability and operational efficiency. Waterline Projects was tasked with providing crucial structural design and fabrication expertise to overcome these hurdles, ensuring the furnace met stringent performance and environmental targets.

Key challenges included designing robust platforms and access ways that could withstand the intense operational environment of a glass furnace, as well as engineering the specialized furnace exhaust ducting. The project also required meticulous attention to detail for components like the HV switch room and Deisel tank foundations, all while adhering to German design specifications for critical furnace and feed platforms.

Waterline Projects' Role in the Visy Project

Waterline Projects played a pivotal role in the successful realization of Visy's sustainable glass furnace by leveraging their extensive civil and structural engineering capabilities. Their involvement spanned the detailed structural design and fabrication of numerous essential components, directly contributing to the project's overall efficiency and environmental objectives.

The firm's expertise was applied to a variety of critical areas, including the 500m2 Cold End Platform, forming machine access platforms, the HV switch room, spout platforms, sampling access ways, and charge floor access stairs. Furthermore, Waterline provided engineering sign-off for the furnace and feed platforms, demonstrating their comprehensive understanding and application of complex engineering principles.

Environmental Impact and Efficiency Gains of the Visy Glass Furnace

The completion of Visy's new glass furnace in Western Sydney marks a significant advancement in sustainable manufacturing, boasting a remarkable 45% reduction in energy usage compared to its predecessor. This substantial energy saving is a testament to the innovative engineering and design implemented throughout the project, aligning with Visy's commitment to environmental stewardship and the circular economy.

This state-of-the-art facility is engineered to produce an impressive volume of up to 628 million bottles annually, demonstrating a powerful synergy between high-capacity production and reduced environmental footprint. The project's success underscores the potential for advanced engineering solutions to drive both economic viability and ecological responsibility within the industrial sector.

Waterline Projects' Commitment to Sustainable Engineering

Waterline Projects is dedicated to delivering engineering solutions that prioritize sustainability and long-term viability for their clients. Their approach to projects like the Visy glass furnace emphasizes optimizing efficiency and minimizing environmental impact through meticulous planning, advanced analysis, and robust structural design.

By integrating cost-efficiency and effectiveness into every stage of their work, Waterline ensures that their engineering outputs not only meet immediate project needs but also contribute positively to their clients' return on investment and overall sustainability goals. This commitment is reflected in their ability to provide technically sound and realistically implementable solutions for complex industrial infrastructure.