Silica & Glass Briefing, 2 October 2026: Chinese PV Glass Keeps Rising as Italy Warns on Energy Costs
Chinese PV glass prices kept climbing on a fourth month of destocking, while Italy's glassmakers warned that quadrupled energy costs put 30,000 jobs at risk. Vical and Fives will build a 200 t/day all-electric container furnace, Cal/OSHA advanced its engineered-stone rule, and SCHOTT named a new CEO.
SMM reports 2.0 mm double-layer coated PV glass up 10.8 % since early August to RMB 11.25/m² and 3.2 mm up 4.2 % to RMB 17.3/m², with inventories down to about 38 days — a fourth consecutive month of destocking — and low-priced competitive orders disappearing as the floor firms around RMB 10/m².
Assovetro vice president Marco Ravasi (also CEO of Verallia Italia) said energy costs for Italian glassmakers have quadrupled, putting around 30,000 jobs and 2.2 Mt/yr of recycling capacity at risk without reform that decouples gas costs from marginal pricing.
Vical and Fives will build what they describe as the world's largest all-electric glass furnace: a 200 t/day Prium E-Melt cold-top melter for flint and green container glass at Vicesa in Costa Rica, where 99 % of grid power is renewable.
Markets & Prices
Chinese PV glass prices continued climbing through late September. 2.0 mm double-layer coated glass rose 10.8 % since early August to RMB 11.25/m², and 3.2 mm gained 4.2 % to RMB 17.3/m². Inventories fell to about 38 days, a fourth consecutive month of destocking, and low-priced competitive orders are disappearing as the floor firms around RMB 10/m². SMM also notes demand-side constraints beginning to emerge.
Italy's glass sector warned that energy costs have quadrupled. Assovetro vice president Marco Ravasi, also CEO of Verallia Italia, said around 30,000 jobs and 2.2 Mt/yr of recycling capacity are at risk without reform that decouples gas costs from marginal pricing.
A Schneider Electric interview framed energy volatility plus CBAM compliance as the central capex question for European glassmakers, setting out priorities for electrification and energy-management investment.
Silica sand pricing and glass-sector M&A were quiet: no new benchmark prints or deals surfaced in the window. Carried over rather than new, the most recent US silica price data point remains August's 3.08 % decline on comfortable supply.
Technology & Innovation
Vical and Fives will build what they call the world's largest all-electric glass furnace — a 200 t/day Prium E-Melt cold-top melter for flint and green container glass at Vicesa in Costa Rica, where 99 % of grid power is renewable.
NVIDIA is reportedly pressing substrate makers in Korea, Japan and Taiwan to have glass substrates ready within two years, putting possible adoption ahead of 2028. AUO, Innolux, GTOC and TPK-KY are scaling through-glass-via and glass-core capability; yield and qualification remain the main hurdles.
PeroCycle and Glass Futures signed an MoU on industrial carbon recycling, using the St Helens pilot facilities for catalyst manufacturing and reactor integration over a six-month evaluation before any commercial terms.
University of Tsukuba researchers published a model explaining why glass loses transparency to terahertz light, linking the terahertz dielectric response to internal mechanical properties and microscopic charge fluctuations.
Regulation & Sustainability
Cal/OSHA advanced its expedited rule on engineered stone, following the petition reported in last week's edition. The rule would prohibit fabrication of engineered stone containing more than 1 % crystalline silica 60 days after taking effect, alongside multilingual worker notification, documentation duties, and PAPRs with an assigned protection factor of at least 1,000 for high-exposure tasks. The material and exposure route differ from glass sand, but the proceeding shapes US regulatory attention on crystalline silica generally.
Glass for Europe published a Q&A on flat glass recycling ahead of the Circular Economy Act, arguing that cullet quality — not just volume — determines whether recovered glass can re-enter flat glass production, and pushing for closed-loop collection.
Wiegand-Glas said recycling technology is "nearly perfected" but the system needs a logistics and collection overhaul. It cites 77 % average recycled content (over 95 % for green glass) against a German average of 60 %, and about 215,000 t of CO₂ saved annually.
Glass for Europe launched the #MoreThanYouSee campaign, positioning flat glass against EU priorities on energy efficiency, renewables, recycling and industrial resilience.
Companies & Projects
Vidrala consolidated its two Portuguese plants, Gallo Vidro and Santos Barosa, into a single Vidrala Marinha Grande operation with 900 employees and output of 2.6 billion containers a year.
SCHOTT named Stefan Brandl CEO effective 1 November, succeeding Torsten Derr, who leaves the Management Board on 31 October for personal and family reasons.
Forglass completed mechanical and electrical installation of the batch plant at Euroglas Lommel and is moving to cold-end and cullet-return work. It claims the first full-scale float glass batch plant run on a Siemens SIMATIC PCS neo control system.
GIMAV appointed Matteo Padovan vice president, with stated priorities of supply-chain integration, faster adoption of digitisation and AI, and repositioning Vitrum as an ecosystem platform.