From mixed to separate collection of solid waste: Benefits for the town of Zavidovići (Bosnia and Herzegovina)

In Bosnia and Herzegovina only 50% of the municipalities have a well-organized service for (mixed) waste collection and disposal. Illegal dumping is very common, in particular in rural areas, which are not regularly served by any service of collection. This situation leads to serious risks for public health and has dangerous environmental impacts. In Zavidovi?i the municipality is trying to meet high standards in the delivery of services of waste collection, but is constrained by scarce financial and technical resources. Different scenarios for the implementation of a system of separate collection in Zavidovi?i were elaborated in order to provide a useful tool for decision making by comparing costs and environmental & economic benefits of each scenario. Six scenarios were considered, based on different recovery rates for plastic, paper & cardboard, and metals. Benefits resulting from the implementation of each of the proposed scenarios are compared in terms of savings of landfill volume and costs. The study concludes that the adoption of a system of separate collection could generate positive impacts on all the stakeholders involved in the solid waste management sector in Zavidovi?i and could contribute to the compliance of European standards in many Central and Eastern European countries as established by a number of national environmental protection strategies.     

Towards a coherent European approach for taxation of combustible waste

Although intra-European trade of combustible waste has grown strongly in the last decade, incineration and landfill taxes remain disparate within Europe. The paper proposes a more coherent taxation approach for Europe that is based on the principle of Pigovian taxation, i.e. the internalization of environmental damage costs. The approach aims to create a level playing field between European regions while reinforcing incentives for sustainable management of combustible waste. Three important policy recommendations emerge. First, integrating waste incineration into the European Emissions Trading System for greenhouse gases (EU ETS) reduces the risk of tax competition between regions. Second, because taxation of every single air pollutant from waste incineration is cumbersome, a differentiated waste incineration tax based on NO_x emissions can serve as a second-best instrument. Finally, in order to strengthen incentives for ash treatment, a landfill tax should apply for landfilled incineration residues. An example illustrates the coherence of the policy recommendations for incineration technologies with diverse environmental effects.     

A goal-oriented characterization of urban waste

More stringent requirements for the protection of the environment coupled with new incentives for materials recovery, lead modern waste management practice on the line of a more differentiated approach. Separation, or more precisely, non-mixing at the source, is one of the most promising strategies. However, before deciding which categories of urban waste should be collected separately, it is useful to have more detailed knowledge regarding the characteristics of waste. A 5-year investigation has produced enough information to answer such questions as “if one decides to convert food and garden waste to compost instead of burning them, how much less cadmium would be released into the atmosphere?” or, “if the quantities of mercury released into the environment should be drastically reduced, which categories of waste should be collected and treated separately?” This paper discusses sampling and analytical techniques and defines what is a representative sample. It presents the methods applied to determine the annual flow of various chemical elements from 52 waste categories from a European urban area. The results determined through this approach are compared to the total outputs in the gas, wastewater, cinders and fly ashes of the incinerator which currently burns these wastes.     

A Study of Sustainable Material Management Approach in Taiwan

Sustainable material management (SMM) has been initiated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in 2005. SMM is an approach to promote resource conservation, reducing negative environmental impacts and preserving the natural capital of material and the balance of economic efficiency and social equity. Life cycle assessment and material flow analysis have been widely used to estimate the environmental impacts for resource consumption, but economic development has not been taken into account. Before 1984, improper garbage disposal was not an important issue in Taiwan. But over the past three decades, the Taiwan Government has accomplished not only waste disposal but also resource recycling, which are conducive to the essence of SMM. This study is the first research project to develop a SMM conceptual model for policy and strategy in Taiwan. SMM is the suitable waste management concept for the next era. This study reviewed the policy and strategy that has been applied in Taiwan’s waste management, and compares the efficiency of waste management policy in Taiwan with the concept of SMM. A case study of the waste flow will be used to prove that the sustainable material policy can be a suitable management system to achieve sustainable development. This study will open a new chapter of research on global SMM for Taiwan.     

Material flow indicators to measure progress toward a sound material-cycle society

This article reviews recent progress in material flow analysis and its use in providing resource productivity indicators and is based on developments in Japanese policy toward a sound material-cycle society and in international forums such as within the Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation, covering both institutional and methodological issues. Indicators derived from economy-wide material flow accounts such as direct material inputs are useful to demonstrate the absolute size of a physical economy and to reinforce the need to both reduce consumption of natural resources and limit waste generation. Interpretation of material flows as resources and potential environmental impacts is discussed, and linkages between the size of material flows and specific environmental impacts and damage must be further elaborated for use in environmental policy. Lessons learned from the practical use of resource productivity indicators are also discussed. Additional indicators are needed that can be used to evaluate the performance of microeconomic contributors. The need for an integrated approach that links upstream resource issues and downstream waste issues through the 3Rs concept or the circular economy/society concept is attracting increasing attention. Consequently, the accumulation of reliable scientific knowledge and data in this field in a fully international context is essential.     

Measuring waste prevention

The Waste Framework Directive (WFD-2008/98/EC) has set clear waste prevention procedures, including reporting, reviewing, monitoring and evaluating. Based on the WFD, the European Commission and will offer support to Member States on how to develop waste prevention programmes through guidelines and information sharing on best practices. Monitoring and evaluating waste prevention activities are critical, as they constitute the main tools to enable policy makers, at the national and local level, to build their strategic plans and ensure that waste prevention initiatives are effective and deliver behaviour change. However, how one can measure something that is not there, remains an important and unresolved research question. The paper reviews and attempts to evaluate the methods that are being used for measuring waste prevention and the impact of relevant implemented activities at the household level, as the available data is still limited.     

Waste recycling policy in Hong Kong

The positive non-intervention policy adopted by the Hong Kong Government has successfully led Hong Kong to an economically prosperous stage. Nevertheless, the extension of this policy to the area of waste management and waste recycling is a major reason for the sluggish waste recovery rate in Hong Kong even given the fact that Hong Kong is experiencing perhaps the greatest pressure from waste disposal in the world. The official approach to waste recycling is one of bottom-up promotion and encouragement of recycling through environmental education. While environmental education is indispensable in the course of promoting waste recycling, the use of top-down measures, such as legislation and fiscal policies, may be needed for a sustainable waste management. Waste management in Hong Kong has meant “coping with” the continuous growth in waste volume. However, in other areas of environmental management, such as air, water and noise, economic and regulatory instruments like tax differentiation and legislative control have been employed thus showing that a deviation from the minimal regulation requirement is sometimes considered justifiable. The low priority given to waste management and waste recycling for top-down measures leads to the loss of a lot of precious and non-renewable resources, and detriment to the welfare of future generations.     

Status and prospects of pay-as-you-throw in Europe - a review of pilot research and implementation studies

Over the past 20 years, significant advances have been made in developing efficient schemes to charge households for their actual waste generation. Viable fee models and technical solutions which are applicable to different environments and provide waste generators with individual incentives for waste diversion efforts have increased the recognition of pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) as an effective instrument for recycling-oriented waste management and financing. On this basis, PAYT has become a practical reality in an increasing number of countries in Europe. Even countries with traditional reservations for direct charging have started to make consideration of PAYT in the revision of their national policy programmes. A situational analysis performed at the European level showed that detailed insights regarding the concrete reactions, red flags and wider benefits inherent to such scheme may still have to be further dispersed in order to overcome the caveats on PAYT and eventually adopt the approach on a larger scale. Claims that the results of PAYT applications are only local in meaning can be disproved as many of the developments bear universal character and can be verified even for larger territories using such schemes in different ways. Including results from an international research co-operation and comparative studies conducted in Germany, this article examines the state-of-the-art of PAYT and shades light onto some of the generally observed implications of its implementation. In conclusion, an outlook on the further potentials and propagation of this scheme is given.     

Industrial waste minimization--experience from Lithuania.

Waste represents the loss of both material and energy resources. Because excessive waste generation is a symptom of inefficient production processes, low durability of goods and unsustainable consumption patterns, waste quantities can be considered as an indicator of how efficiently society uses raw materials. Therefore, good waste management begins with preventing waste from being generated. The objective of this paper is to present the work related to waste minimization in Lithuania by introducing successful examples from industry, to bring ideas and inspiration to authorities, companies, and others working in the field of waste minimization. The paper is supporting EU waste policy manifested in the EU waste strategy and the proposed Sixth Environmental Action Programme. Many enterprises are still unaware of the full costs of waste management. Therefore, by applying the methodology presented in the paper, companies could make substantial reductions in their waste, and therefore, disposal costs. Waste minimization (WM) often results in substantial savings through reduced purchasing costs and more efficient practices. It also has wide environmental benefits such as reduced energy consumption and less environmental pollution, conservation of natural resources and extension of valuable landfill capacity. Therefore, waste prevention should have the highest priority in waste strategies, as this is the only way to stop the growth of the amount of waste and reduce the loss of resources (EUC Bulletin 12, 1996).     

Environmental Policy and Spatial Planning in Greece. Institutional Aspects

The integration of the environmental dimension into sectoral and regional policies constitutes a dominant concern of the current EU strategy for sustainable development. Thus, physical planning as an instrument of environmental policy and its combination with environmental planning, both at a policy as well as implementation level is a key pursuit in almost all European countries. In Greece, the adoption of a concept about a rational and unified approach of physical and environmental planning has met with many difficulties. The aim of this paper is to contribute towards a critical approach of recent developments, mainly in the field of the institutional framework for spatial and environmental planning in Greece.     

Integrated solid waste management based on the 3R approach

Integrated solid waste management (ISWM) based on the 3R approach (reduce, reuse, and recycle) is aimed at optimizing the management of solid waste from all the waste-generating sectors (municipal, construction and demolition, industrial, urban agriculture, and healthcare facilities) and involving all the stakeholders (waste generators, service providers, regulators, government, and community/neighborhoods). This article discusses the concept of solid waste management (SWM). Initially, SWM was aimed at reducing the risks to public health, and later the environmental aspect also became an important focus of SWM. Recently, another dimension is becoming a critical factor for SWM, i.e., resource conservation and resource recovery. Hence, the 3R approach is becoming a guiding factor for SWM. On the one hand, 3R helps to minimize the amount of waste from generation to disposal, thus managing the waste more effectively and minimizing the public health and environmental risks associated with it. On the other hand, resource recovery is maximized at all stages of SWM. Lately, the new concept of ISWM has been introduced to streamline all the stages of waste management, i.e., source separation, collection and transportation, transfer stations and material recovery, treatment and resource recovery, and final disposal. It was originally targeted at municipal solid waste management (MSWM), but now the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) is promoting this concept to cover all waste generating sectors to optimize the level of material and resource recovery for recycling as well as to improve the efficiency of waste management services. The ISWM concept is being transformed into ISWM systems to replace conventional SWM systems. This article further discusses the implementation process for ISWM. The process includes a baseline study on the characterization and quantification of waste for all waste generating sectors within a city, assessment of current waste management systems and practices, target setting for ISWM, identification of issues of concern and suggestions from stakeholders, development of a draft ISWM plan, preparation of an implementation strategy, and establishment of a monitoring and feedback system. UNEP is assisting member countries and their cities to develop an ISWM plan covering all the waste generating sectors within a specific geographical or administrative area such as a city or municipality. This umbrella approach is useful to generate sufficient volumes of recycling materials required to make recycling industries feasible. This is also helpful for efficient reallocation of resources for SWM such as collection vehicles, transfer stations, treatment plants, and disposal sites. UNEP is assisting cities to develop and implement ISWM based on the 3R approach. These experiences could be useful for other countries to develop and implement ISWM to achieve improved public health, better environmental protection, and resource conservation and resource recovery.     

3R strategies for the establishment of an international sound material-cycle society

Focusing on the promotion of the “3Rs” – reduce, reuse, and recycle – the authors summarize the policy that Japan has evolved in waste management and recycling policy over the years. To realize an international sound material-cycle society (SMS), the 3R approaches should first be implemented in each individual country. After each country has established an SMS to the best of its ability, contribution toward reducing the environmental load internationally, especially across all of East Asia, will be achieved by having waste and recyclable resources that cannot be handled in one country effectively used or processed in other countries. The current situation of international resource circulation is described and a concept of SMS at an international level is proposed. The views expressed herein are those of the authors and are not necessarily the official views of the organizations with which the authors are affiliated.     

Environmental and economic analyses of waste disposal options for traditional markets in Indonesia

Waste from traditional markets in Indonesia is the second largest stream of municipal solid waste after household waste. It has a higher organic fraction and may have greater potential to be managed on a business scale compared to household wastes. The attributed reason is that in general the wastes generated from traditional markets are more uniform, more concentrated and less hazardous than waste from other sources. This paper presents the results of environmental and economic assessments to compare the options available for traditional market waste disposal in Indonesia. The options compared were composting in labour intensive plants, composting in a centralised plant that utilised a simple wheel loader, centralised biogas production and landfill for electricity production. The current open dumping practice was included as the baseline case. A life cycle assessment (LCA) was used for environmental analysis. All options compared have lower environmental impacts than the current practice of open dumping. The biogas production option has the lowest environmental impacts. A cost-benefit analysis, which considered greenhouse gas savings, was used for the economic assessment. It was found that composting at a centralised plant is the most economically feasible option under the present Indonesian conditions. The approach reported in this study could be applied for 'a pre-feasibility first cut comparison' that includes environmental aspects in a decision-making framework for developing countries even though European emission factors were used.     

The ISB model (infrastructure, service, behaviour): a tool for waste practitioners

In response to the EU Landfill Directive and the challenge of mitigating climate change, the UK government (nationally and locally) must develop strategies and policies to reduce, recycle, compost and recover waste. Best practice services that yield high recycling rates, such as alternate weekly collections, are now largely mainstream in suitable areas. However, national recycling performance is short of what is needed; policy makers must look for innovative ways to meet challenging recycling targets.Increasingly, local authorities are using behaviour change interventions to encourage the public to recycle; these tend to be based on the premise that an individuals’ behaviour is predetermined by their values. In practice, this has led to a host of initiatives that attempt to change individuals’ behaviour without addressing situational barriers. In this paper, we argue that that a behaviour-centric approach has limited effectiveness. Using an analysis of the literature and studies that investigated recycling participation in the city of Portsmouth, we have identified three significant clusters that can facilitate effective recycling: infrastructure, service and behaviour (ISB). We present the ISB model - a tool that can be used by waste practitioners when planning interventions to maximise recycling to better understand the situation and context for behaviour. Analysis using the ISB model suggests that current best practice, “business as usual” interventions could realistically achieve a national recycling rate of 50%. If the UK is to move towards zero waste, policy makers must look “upstream” for interventions that change the situational landscape.     

Application of the WAMED model to landfilling

A cost methodology is proposed for evaluating the ecological-economic efficiency of a municipal solid waste management scheme based on the recommendations of cost-benefit analysis and the full-cost accounting methodology for municipal solid waste management. The methodology employs the previously introduced waste managements’ efficient decision (WAMED) model and the company statistical business tool for environmental recovery (COSTBUSTER) indicator. A case study presents the practical application of the proposed cost-benefit analysis-based theory to the landfilling concept currently applied in Kalmar, Sweden. It is concluded that the presented provisions for evaluation of the ecological-economic efficiency of a municipal solid waste management scheme reflect a novel integrated approach to solving the problem of simultaneously decreasing the negative impacts of municipal solid waste on the environment and the health of the population while providing an information support tool for decision making in municipal solid waste management at regional and municipal levels to improve small-and medium-sized company competitiveness in particular.     

Building waste management core indicators through Spatial Material Flow Analysis: Net recovery and transport intensity indexes

In this paper, the material and spatial characterization of the flows within a municipal solid waste (MSW) management system are combined through a Network-Based Spatial Material Flow Analysis. Using this information, two core indicators are developed for the bio-waste fraction, the Net Recovery Index (NRI) and the Transport Intensity Index (TII), which are aimed at assessing progress towards policy-related sustainable MSW management strategies and objectives. The NRI approaches the capacity of a MSW management system for converting waste into resources through a systematic metabolic approach, whereas the TII addresses efficiency in terms of the transport requirements to manage a specific waste flow throughout the entire MSW management life cycle. Therefore, both indicators could be useful in assessing key MSW management policy strategies, such as the consecution of higher recycling levels (sustainability principle) or the minimization of transport by locating treatment facilities closer to generation sources (proximity principle). To apply this methodological approach, the bio-waste management system of the region of Catalonia (Spain) has been chosen as a case study. Results show the adequacy of both indicators for identifying those points within the system with higher capacity to compromise its environmental, economic and social performance and therefore establishing clear targets for policy prioritization. Moreover, this methodological approach permits scenario building, which could be useful in assessing the outcomes of hypothetical scenarios, thus proving its adequacy for strategic planning.     

International comparative study of 3R and waste management policy developments

Reduce, reuse, and recycle (3R) policies form the basis of waste management and global warming countermeasures globally, so we conducted a comparative study of 3R and waste management policies in the European Union (EU), USA, Korea, Japan, China, and Vietnam. An international workshop for 3R and waste management policymakers was held in Kyoto, Japan, and a bibliographic survey was also conducted to collect data. 3R policies are clearly given priority in the hierarchy of waste management in every country studied. Thermal recovery, which includes power generation from waste heat and methane gas collected from organic waste, is also a priority; this is consistent with the increased use of countermeasures to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In the EU, waste management is characterized by practical and effective 3R policies through the development of realistic regulations and by the policymakers??desire to simplify management systems. The policy ideal in China, however, is the development of a circular economy that targets reductions in the amount and hazardousness of waste. Limits on the number of final disposal sites, strategies for procuring resources, and GHG emission countermeasures are closely linked with 3R policies, and further development of 3R policies in parallel with such issues is expected.     

Review of LCA studies of solid waste management systems – Part II: Methodological guidance for a better practice

Life cycle assessment (LCA) is increasingly used in waste management to identify strategies that prevent or minimise negative impacts on ecosystems, human health or natural resources. However, the quality of the provided support to decision- and policy-makers is strongly dependent on a proper conduct of the LCA. How has LCA been applied until now? Are there any inconsistencies in the past practice? To answer these questions, we draw on a critical review of 222 published LCA studies of solid waste management systems. We analyse the past practice against the ISO standard requirements and the ILCD Handbook guidelines for each major step within the goal definition, scope definition, inventory analysis, impact assessment, and interpretation phases of the methodology. Results show that malpractices exist in several aspects of the LCA with large differences across studies. Examples are a frequent neglect of the goal definition, a frequent lack of transparency and precision in the definition of the scope of the study, e.g. an unclear delimitation of the system boundaries, a truncated impact coverage, difficulties in capturing influential local specificities such as representative waste compositions into the inventory, and a frequent lack of essential sensitivity and uncertainty analyses. Many of these aspects are important for the reliability of the results. For each of them, we therefore provide detailed recommendations to practitioners of waste management LCAs.     

Techno-economic assessment of municipal solid waste management in Jordan

Mismanagement of solid waste leads to public health risks, adverse environmental impacts and other socio-economic problems. This is obvious in many developing countries around the world. Currently, several countries have realized that the way they manage their solid wastes does not satisfy the objectives of sustainable development. Therefore, these countries, including Jordan, which forms the case study presented here, have decided to move away from traditional solid waste management (SWM) options to more integrated solid waste management approaches. Unfortunately, in many developing countries like Jordan, the lack of adequate resources to implement the necessary changes is posing a serious obstacle. The present paper discusses the various practices and challenges of solid waste management in Jordan from both a technical and economic perspective. An overview of the current practices and their environmental implications in three major cities of the country, which generate more than 70% of the country's solid waste, is presented. Recent literature on solid waste management in Jordan has been reviewed; and data on the total amount of municipal solid waste generated, compositional variations over the last two decades, and future projections are presented. The necessity, importance and needs of solid waste recovery and reuse are identified. The review of the legal frameworks indicated that there is a need for detailed and clear regulations dealing specifically with solid waste. The service cost analysis revealed that none of the municipalities in Jordan sufficiently recover the cost of the services, with more than 50% being subsidized from the municipalities' budgets. The allocation of the available resources was analyzed and service performance indicators assessed. Factors that should be taken into consideration when making the decision to move from a traditional SWM approach to a more integrated approach are highlighted and suggestions for a more smooth transition are recommended.     

Municipal wastes and their solar transformities: an emergy synthesis for Macao

The debate over waste management practices has become increasingly important as human activities have begun to overload the biosphere's assimilative capacity. An effective waste management policy should be based on the principles of sustainable development, with wastes regarded as a potential resource rather than solely as something to eliminate. This approach requires an integrated waste management plan that makes full use of all available technologies. Macao is a highly populated consumer society that lacks natural resources and must therefore import almost all of its life-supporting goods and raw materials from regions outside the city. During the past 20 years, Macao has experienced an economic boom, accompanied by rapid socioeconomic development. Its discharged wastes have increased steadily during this period. This paper employs emergy analysis to investigate Macao's waste treatment in 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2004. The emergy of gaseous emissions was estimated to be 4.76 x 10(21) sej in 2004. Since 1992, Macao's municipal solid waste (MSW) has been incinerated to reduce its volume. The transformity of the fly ash and slag produced by this treatment in 2004, and the electricity generated by the incinerator, equaled 5.11 x 10(11) sej/g, 6.01 x 10(10) sej/g, and 7.61 x 10(6) sej/J, respectively. A large investment of natural resources and technology is required for the treatment of wastes; the feedback ratio of wastes, which represents the scale of the treatment of inputs, equaled 0.02 for MSW, 0.11 for sewage, and 0.06 for gaseous emissions.