Destruction of Pathogens During Glass Melting
British Glass represents the UK Glass Industry and related suppliers across various sectors, including container, flat, glass, domestic, crystal and scientific.
British Glass has obtained the following advice from the UK Food Standards Agency concerning the absence of any risk from ‘pathogens’ as relating to the raw materials used in the manufacture of glass containers.
“The time temperature regime in glass production is easily sufficient to destroy food pathogens. As a comparison, the last treatment process developed to destroy Clostridium Botulinmum spores during ‘canning’ is 1210C for three minutes or equivalent.”
Clearly this treatment is significantly exceeded by the typical glass melting temperature of 14500C and typical annealing schedule for the final product (inexcess of 5000C for 30 minutes or more).
Further information on the heat stability of food pathogens is available in any general microbiology textbook.
On average, every family in the UK uses around 330 glass bottles and jars each year.