The University of Queensland PhD candidate, who is the son of Harden residents Pat and "Buster" Pirie, this month became the first Australian to win Young Innovator of the Year at the world's premier conference for research and innovation, Falling Walls Berlin, Germany.

The young researcher won the international competition with his presentation about a process that could turn waste glass that can't be recycled into every day products ranging from fertilisers, laundry detergents and tyres to toothpaste.

On a science front he said teacher Jan Young of Harden had been a big influence earlier in his life before he praised the entire teaching bodies at the local schools.

"There were some great teachers, and I imagine there still are, at the high school when I was going through.

"We're very fortunate to have the teachers that we do in a small country town," he said.

A recipient of assistance from the Harden District Education Foundation, which allowed him to complete undergraduate study at Sydney University, Mr Pirie's winning pitch explained how his work used broken glass that hasn't been sorted into the right colour, which becomes destined for landfill, to create sodium silicate.

The process is currently going through a commercialisation stage. From first trials to filing a patent for the process took the development team around 18 months.

"At the moment we're estimating that because it takes a lot of energy to make the glass in the first place, we're able to utilise both the energy and the raw materials and we think we can decrease the production costs by at least 50 per cent," Mr Pirie said.

"It requires less energy, raw materials and capital, and that's before you consider the reduced social and economic costs compared to landfilling material," he said.

The process, developed with Professor Damien Batstone from UQ's Advanced Water Management Centre, can be used to make thousands of products, from concrete sealers to detergents.

"We're taking waste class which is currently going to landfill," Mr Pirie said.

"More than half of all glass is not recycled, in large because it is smashed into pieces which are too small to sort into the right colour,

"This represents a huge waste of energy and raw materials.

"We're dissolving it into a chemical which most people know as drain cleaner.

"Once it is in that form it can be used as an industrial feed stock to make lots of things like tyres, detergents or silica gel.

"We can get all of the silica out of the glass. It takes about 1.3 kilos of waste glass to make 1 kilo of silica gel."

Mr Pirie explained that it takes a lot of energy to make the glass in the first place and the process utilises both the energy and the raw materials.

"We think we can decrease production costs by about 50 per cent," he said.

"We can dissolve all of the waste glass and most goes into saleable products so we have very little waste at the end of the (process).

"My PhD has highlighted how we need to make use of both the raw materials in 'waste' streams and the energy embodied in them during manufacture."

UQ Vice-Chancellor and President Professor Peter Hj paid tribute to Mr Pirie.

"It was a privilege to see a UQ PhD scholar succeed in a field of 100 top young researchers from more than 60 countries," Professor Hj said.

The Falling Walls Conference is a global gathering of innovators and scientists, brought together to share their breakthroughs and plans to impact science and society.

The conference is held annually on the anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, with 2019 marking 30 years since the wall fell.

Rhys was selected to present in Berlin by the Australian Academy of Science after impressing judges at the Falling Walls Lab Australia event in Canberra in September.

His research was made possible through the generosity of the Warwick and Nancy Olsen PhD scholarship, and he received support from Trade and Investment Queensland and UQ Global Engagement and Entrepreneurship to attend Falling Walls Berlin.