For debate in the Standing Committee — see Rule 15 of the Rules of Procedure

Doc. 11173
5 February 2007

Management of municipal solid waste in Europe

Report
Committee on the Environment, Agriculture and Local and Regional Affairs
Rapporteur: Mr Cezar Preda, Romania, Group of the European People’s Party

Summary

Proper management of solid waste is a central pillar of far-sighted, sustainable environmental policies. Inadequate management of municipal waste results in considerable public health hazards and additional costs in both the short and the long term.

Management of solid waste is one of the major challenges currently facing local authorities, especially in large conurbations. Collecting, sorting, processing and recycling solid urban waste in an environmentally friendly manner while taking account of the needs of urban development demands a coherent approach and solutions that are sustainable in the medium and long term.

The member states of the Council of Europe show significant differences in respect to solid waste management standards and practices. It is therefore recommended that a number of minimum standards with respect to waste handling be implemented and the Assembly urges member states to develop an integrated approach to municipal solid waste management in order to contribute to sustainable urban development in Europe

A.       Draft Resolution

1.       Proper management of solid waste is a central pillar of far-sighted, sustainable environmental policies. Inadequate management of municipal waste results in considerable public health hazards and additional costs in both the short and the long term.

2.       Every European generates approximately 1 kg of solid household waste a day and the figures show an upward trend. Management of solid waste is therefore one of the major challenges currently facing local authorities, especially in large conurbations.

3.       In this connection, the Assembly supports Recommendation 189 (2006) and Resolution 213 (2006) of the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe on local and regional waste management and the siting of landfills and wishes the necessary measures to be taken at local and regional level in terms of the management of municipal solid waste.

4.       Collecting, sorting, processing and recycling solid urban waste in an environmentally friendly manner while taking account of the needs of urban development demands a coherent approach and solutions that are sustainable in the medium and long term.

5.       The issue of municipal solid waste involves both aspects relating to the services which municipal authorities must provide for the public in terms of hygiene, health and living conditions and also management-related aspects concerning decentralisation, private-sector involvement and instilling responsible attitudes among the public.

6.       If their design and siting do not meet the relevant environmental and health criteria, municipal landfills can cause pollution (e.g. contamination of groundwater, air pollution, odours) that may have serious consequences for public health and the environment.

7.       Waste that piles up or is not collected on time and illegal dumping present serious risks for health and the environment. As far as waste processing is concerned, unless strict standards are complied with, there is a risk of high-pollution emissions (in particular of dioxin) occurring during incineration.

8.       There are significant differences between Council of Europe member states regarding solid waste management standards and practices. Countries with no minimum standards for solid waste management face negative impacts on their environment and economic development.

9.       The Assembly therefore urges member states to develop an integrated approach to municipal solid waste management in order to contribute to sustainable urban development in Europe, in particular by:

9.1.       ensuring compliance with occupational health and safety standards during the collection, processing and landfilling of all types of waste, in particular by banning any barehanded operations and any recovery of waste from landfills without proper protection and regular health checks for the persons involved;

9.2.       establishing regular waste collection systems for all urban, suburban and rural areas (exceptions should only be granted for remote locations with approved, safe individual waste disposal facilities) and including in the relevant legislation phased targets for the provision of municipal solid waste collection systems in accordance with the requirements of European Union Directive No 1999/31/EC on the landfill of waste;

9.3.       enforcing compliance with strict standards for landfilling, for instance:

9.3.1.       landfills must be fenced and patrolled;

9.3.2.       waste accepted at landfills must be recorded;

9.3.3.       waste placed in landfills must regularly be covered with suitable material (e.g. construction debris) in order to reduce odour, windblown litter and vermin;

9.3.4.       adjacent groundwater must be monitored;

9.3.5.       depending on local hydrogeology, suitable measures for groundwater protection (such as landfill liners and leachate collection) must be put in place;

9.4.       planning waste management through the development of strategies including the gradual reduction/phasing out of the landfilling of specific waste streams, given their recyclability and/or the impacts related to their disposal (e.g. biodegradable waste);

9.5.       assigning municipalities responsibility for managing waste from households, businesses, institutions and construction and demolition activities within their territory and enabling municipalities which are too small to provide the relevant services to set up inter-municipal consortia for solid waste management;

9.6.       facilitating co-operation between European towns and cities to allow information exchanges so that the best solutions in terms both of administrative management of municipal solid waste and of processing technologies are disseminated and used Europe-wide;

9.7.       encouraging R&D in the field of solid waste processing and recycling.

10.       The Assembly urges the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe to follow up its work on local and regional waste management and to encourage initiatives by local and regional authorities in this area.

B.       Explanatory memorandum by Mr Cezar Preda

Table of contents

I. Introduction

II. Solid waste – a consequence of life

i. Sources, types, amounts and composition

ii. Why regulate waste management?

iii. How to steer waste management

a) Materials Sorting and Recycling Technologies

b) Technical issues

iv. Institutional and economical issues

v. What needs to be done?

III.       Solid waste – a survey in the member states of the Council of Europe

i. General remarks on the information request

ii. Results of the survey

a) Political responsibility, documentation tasks and planning aspects

b) Amounts

c) Collection and disposal standards

d) Economic issues

IV.       Conclusions

I.       Introduction¹

This present report intends to gather and convey relevant and comprehensive information on status, achievements, and shortcomings in the area of Management of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) in Europe in order to develop suitable policy initiatives where necessary, appropriate and promising.

The first part gives a comprehensive overview on the topic “solid waste”. Including a brief historical overview and some worth knowing ‘rules of a thumb’ figures, it addresses some principles, case studies, and shortcomings related to the situation in Europe leading to some recommendations to be addressed to the Council of Europe member states.

The second part summarizes the outcome of a data request on Municipal Solid Waste Management which was performed early 2006 in the member states of the Council of Europe.

In summary, this document should be seen as the start of a process with significant potential to harmonise information related to waste management and to generally improve the understanding of issues in this industry across nations and at pan-European scale.

II. Solid waste – a consequence of life

Solid wastes are all materials arising from human activities that are normally solid and are discarded as unwanted. Because of their immanent properties, discarded waste materials are often reusable and may be considered a resource in another setting. Solid Waste Management is the term applied to all of the activities associated with the management of society’s waste. The basic goal of Solid Waste Management is to manage society’s waste in a manner that meets public health and environmental concerns as well as the public’s desire to reuse and recycle waste materials.

Slightly adapted from George Tschobanoglous:
Integrated Solid Waste Management, Engineering Principles & Management Issues
(McGraw-Hill, 1993)

From the early days of civilisation, humans have used the earth’s resources and disposed of wastes. In ancient times, waste disposal did not pose a significant problem, for the population was small and land available to receive waste materials was abundant. Waste related problems commenced to occur from the time when humans began to congregate in larger communities. The medieval practice of throwing waste into the unpaved streets, combined with a lack of proper handling of faeces, led to a fast breeding of rats carrying fleas which acted as vectors for the bubonic plague: As a consequence, half of the European population was erased in the fourteenth century.

First regulations regarding proper waste collection in Europe date back to the 18^th century. Technical standards became implemented in all major cities during the industrial revolution. Recovery - at a significant scale and in an organized way - of waste components suitable for animal feed and further industrial processing (glass, metals, paper, textiles) also dates back to the 18^th century and can be found today throughout Europe at all levels.

Starting from last century’s mid-eighties, the 3 R Principle: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle became increasingly implemented in many Central European countries. In the decade to follow, this principle became even more relevant through the strong increase of waste quantities due to significant economic growth (higher living standards, more throw-away-products etc.). This increase leads to a shortage of disposal capacity. This situation was compounded by the rise of the NIMBY (not in my backyard) syndrome which frequently lead to stiff opposition to proposed new waste disposal infrastructure. Concurrently, more and more advanced nations recognised a need to preserve resources and reduce environmental impacts throughout the life cycle of products. Communities developed a growing awareness that significant environmental improvements could be achieved by reducing landfill disposal and recovering resources from ‘waste’ streams. Fig. 18 shows the chronology of this development for an individual country.

i. Sources, types, amounts and composition

Fig. 1: Materials flow & solid waste generation in a technological society
(G. Tschobanoglous, further data refer to appendix)

Main sources of waste, which more or less result in a waste typology – from the position of a municipal administration that is usually responsible for its handling – are households (usually the majority in terms of amount), commercial activities, institutions (from schools over the cemetery to the military), construction and demolition activities, and industry.

Fig. 2 shows a typical waste classification scheme.

Note that the recently introduced term “biodegradables” has become important as EU legislation requires its reduction over time².

Fig. 2:       A typical classification of MSW Municipal Solid Waste

As a rule of thumb, about 1 kg of household waste is generated per citizen and day. In some industrialised countries this value can even be double. However, where this is the case the proportion of source separated materials is also higher thus the quantity requiring disposal can be similar to that of a less developed country. A family of four produces annually about 1 tonne of municipal waste, resulting in required landfill volume of ca. one cubic meter (1 m³). With a typical landfill height of 30 m, a city of one million inhabitants, and 20 % commercial and other waste in addition to its household waste, requires 1 hectare per year for landfilling its waste. This illustrates why technical options with a high potential to reduce the volume of waste for final landfill disposal (eg. incineration reducing the volume down to 15 – 20 %) have been and continue to be in high demand for larger urban centres.

Other benefits including a significant reduction of environmental impact potential from landfill emissions such as landfill gas (not all of which can be captured) and leachate are addressed in chapter Technical issues.

After some separation of recoverable material at source (this separation is always significantly lower than 100 %) the composition of MSW is as follows:

- one third that is compostable (kitchen waste etc.);

- one third that is combustible (plastics, paper, textiles), and

- one third that is inert (glass, ceramics, stones, metals).

In total across these materials there is

- another third of water, contained mainly in the compostable fraction.

Residual Waste (from Households and Commerce) as a whole has the calorific value of brown coal (about 9.000 kJ/kg) provided that none of its components are used as fuel in the stove. If that is the case the calorific value is less than half (and its composition looks like the one shown in Fig. 5 below).

Fig. 3 to Fig. 6 show typical compositions of municipal residual waste, indicating the range found in European household waste bins. The significant differences between the composition in areas with (Fig. 3 & 4) and without (Fig. 5 & 6) developed waste management

systems can be less explained with differences in living standards, cultural background etc. than with the extent to which A) certain information regarding “do's and “don’ts in waste disposal ³ and B) separate collection systems ⁴ are provided.

ii. Why regulate waste management?

Environment and health are public goods where free markets generally fail to provide equitable and sustainable long term solutions.

- Resource Conservation

Often represents an important goal in policy programs reflecting public perception. Looking at the matter in its entirety, other issues appear to have more weight such as…

- Public Health

In many countries – particularly in Eastern and South Eastern Europe –“scavenging”, (searching for recyclables during waste collection and/or disposal, and to herd animals on landfills is still a common practice. Consequences of this activity are as follows:

- People working without any means of personal protection have a reduced life expectancy

- Treatment of diseases – if done at all – results in high costs. Municipalities often spend a considerable portion of their budget on disinfection measures which are often of questionable merit if not completely useless

- Contaminants enter the food chain (milk, meat).

Another practice still carried out in some countries is the open burning of waste during collection or at landfills in order to reduce volumes and/or have better access to scrap metal. This “casual thermal treatment” causes a considerable negative impact on air quality (eg. dioxins get released at high levels under such conditions).

- Quality

Is a driver for the third “R”, Recycling: waste management more and more is not only regarded as a sole technical problem, but also the producer of waste is integrated into the system. This trend can be attributed to the fact that the 'purely technical' systems (i.e. for example to process paper, glass or compost out of mixed household waste) failed. It was proven during the last thirty years that the only way to do the third “R” is to make distinctions between waste streams, and to convince citizens as well as trade and industry to separate refuse at its source.

- Cost

Proper waste management not only avoids costs regarding health issues in the short term as lined out above, but also avoids unexpected costs of aftercare and remediation in the long term (and is furthermore a pre-condition for a sound economic development: Tourism industry for example requests for certain standards). Unsuitable waste disposal resulting in a “brown site” produces various costs:

- The value of the site itself will be diminished which may be of greater relevance in the future as cities tend to grow. Former landfill sites are regularly becoming a planning issue in metropolitan areas

- Environmental costs (e.g. groundwater contamination)

- Loss of investment in infrastructure that cannot be used

- Losses of government revenue (through reduced income tax, property tax)

- Costs to government through potential liability issues.

Cost is a main driver in advanced waste management systems for separate collection and treatment. The cost of treatment and disposal of one tonne of municipal waste is about 100 € (German price level). The cost of separate collection and reprocessing (recycling) of paper is about 30 € after taking into account the revenues from the sale of the paper.

iii. How to steer waste management

This section provides essential information on waste management strategy, development and implementation. Fig. 7 shows the principles of, and Fig. 8 provides a “how–to” for designing a successful waste management strategy including its main elements.

Subsequently, a relatively new principle is explained which is now a central component of the solid waste legislation of the European Union.

Fig. 7:       Hierarchy of a contemporary solid waste management concept

a) Materials Sorting and Recycling Technologies

Material recycling is the practice of collecting, transporting and processing of products separated from municipal waste that are no longer useful in their present form and the use of their material content in the manufacture and sale of new products.

Recycling involves four primary activities:

- Collection and transport;

- Sorting and separation;

- Marketing;

- Reprocessing.

Recycling strategies include:

(a) Traditional sorting of recyclable materials into standardised marketable grades of secondary resources, such as newsprint; glass bottles (usually clear, brown, green); steel and aluminium containers; plastic containers of various sorts (PET, PE, etc.).

(b) Two stage sorting: where mixed dry recyclables are sorted into mixed paper, mixed plastic, mixed glass / metals for later separation using specialised sorting equipment.

Fig. 8: Procedures and elements of a modern solid waste management concept

The sketch to the left illustrates the landfill, an essential component of every waste management system, and its two main emissions, landfill gas and leachate.

Apart from being odorous with the potential to reduce residential amenity, landfill gas predominantly consists of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Leachate contains a range of toxic substances including persistent organic pollutants. Landfill leachate has the potential to pollute ground water reserves thus rendering them unsuitable for human consumption. Both emission types (gas, leachate) can be captured and treated through technical measures (eg. combustion of landfill gas with and without energy recovery). It is noted however, that landfill gas cannot be fully captured which is one of the reasons for the relatively new solid waste management principle adopted by the European Union (see box below).

Since around 10 years, the European Union works toward a reduction (and elimination in the long term) of biodegradable substances from waste prior to ultimate disposal to landfill because these materials are the source of landfill gas and leachate generation.

Fig. 9 illustrates how this important principle fits with existing safeguards that were developed earlier. Each barrier (measure) showed in the figure represents one step in the chronological development of sanitary landfills during the last thirty to fourty years in highly developed central European countries. The Caucasian member states of the Council of Europe have, for example, implemented the first two barriers at the most.

Fig. 9: The Multi-Barrier System for sanitary landfills

This principle was recently transformed into legislation, the EC Directive No 1999/31 („EU Landfill Directive“). In an extensive prescriptive part, this Directive contains Technical Guidelines for the construction and operation of landfills and, in a second part, a phased implementation of reducing biodegradable materials (“Safeguard 6”) as illustrated in Fig. 10.

Fig. 10: Targets given by EC Directive No 1999/31 („EU Landfill Directive“)

b) Technical issues

The activities associated with waste from generation to final disposal can be divided into the following phases:

- storage and collection,

- transport,

- treatment and

- disposal

All of these phases have certain standards applicable to them.

For storage and collection, hygiene issues are of great importance. Standards often reflect climatic conditions, eg. in Southern European countries waste is usually collected at a higher frequency – daily or several times a week – than in colder regions – up to eight weeks in rural alpine areas for example.

For household waste and recyclables, containers with wheels and lids (volumes up to ~ 2 m³) are widely spread; commercial waste producers commonly use larger containers which get exchanged by a collection vehicle (all containers with wheels get unloaded). Depending on the distance to final treatment and/or disposal, collection is sometimes followed by a waste transfer system to bulk up waste for more efficient transportation. This can include also rail and ship.

Main technical requests for household waste collection are regularity of service, certain work protection measures for collection staff (gloves, good visibility in order to avoid traffic accidents), and closed vehicles (to avoid emission of dust and odour).

For the treatment of waste, there are two main options (and combinations thereof):

- Biological treatment, and

- Thermal treatment.

Usually biological treatment options are less costly convenient and thermal treatment options have a higher potential in reducing biodegradable substances. It is noted that this is only a very brief classification.

Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT)

Biological treatment of waste involves two types of waste stabilisation – aerobic decomposition and anaerobic decomposition. Some mechanical treatment of the waste is necessary before processing and the term Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT) is usually applied to describe this range of technologies.

Aerobic Mechanical Biological Treatment

Aerobic MBT involves the decomposition of organic materials by microbial activity under aerobic (in the presence of oxygen) and thermophilic (>45^OC) conditions to produce stabilised organic matter. Pasteurisation takes place when all of the material has been subject to temperatures in excess of 55^OC over a period of at least three consecutive days. Depending on the waste system and process configuration, aerobic decomposition can achieve waste stabilisation, fuel production or a compost product.

Pre-treatment or sorting of the feedstock is an important component of aerobic decomposition. In composting systems there are three objectives for materials separation:

- To recover recyclable or combustible materials as marketable by-products;

- To reduce the levels of visible contaminants (eg, inert materials such as plastics and glass), and

- To reduce the levels of chemical contaminants (eg, heavy metals).

The more homogeneous and contaminant-free the feedstock, the better quality compost will be produced. Aerobic decomposition of source-separated organics produces a moderate to high quality soil conditioner, which can be used in a wide range of markets, including horticulture, viticulture and agriculture, and in specialist landscaping applications such as mine rehabilitation.

There are a number of different treatment types available to achieve aerobic decomposition, as eg. Open Windrow Composting, Drum Composting Systems, Enclosed Composting Halls and as a new option the Dry Stabilate Process, a MBT process that has the principal objective to stabilise MSW through biological drying with the subsequent recovery of resources through waste separation and the production of a secondary fuel, known as dry stabilate.

Anaerobic Mechanical Biological Treatment

Anaerobic MBT involves the controlled degradation of organic wastes by microbial activity in a reactor in the absence of oxygen. It is a well-proven technology for clean, organic feedstock and is extensively applied in the water industry to stabilise biosolids. It is well established in central Europe for treating source separated solid organic wastes and is also used to process municipal solid waste.

Thermal Treatment

Thermal treatment technologies use the application of heat to decompose the waste and produce a stable residue for disposal. Mixed municipal solid waste has a calorific value of about 9 GJ per tonne and a proportion of this energy may be recovered using these technologies, usually in the form of heat and/or electricity.

Conventional incineration of heterogenous waste, or mass burn combustion, is the most widely used thermal process. However, separation at source or preparation of fuel from waste for a specific thermal process is becoming more common as this can result in higher energy recovery efficiencies as well as less waste requiring landfill disposed.

New Thermal Treatment Technologies: A number of new thermal conversion technologies are emerging that have the potential for lower environmental emissions, higher levels of energy recovery and better community acceptance than conventional WTE (Waste-to-Energy). None of these attributes has been fully proven, however, due to the lack of full-scale operating plant experience.

Several commercial scale plants have been constructed in recent years and the technology is in transition to commercialisation. The emerging technologies are based on pyrolysis and gasification or combinations of both.

iv. Institutional and economical issues

Primary responsibility for day-to-day waste management commonly lies with local government (municipalities). Regulatory and strategic planning responsibilities are ideally with a higher level of government, either a regional body or a national agency.

Municipalities with less than, say, 10.000 inhabitants are generally too small to fulfil the various tasks (collection, treatment, fee collection, public relations…) cost effectively. Similar to the situation in the water and waste water industry of many European countries, the installation of Waste Management Groups (Regions, Boards) made up of a number of municipalities has proven successful. A typical size for such associations is in the order of 50.000 – 500.000 inhabitants.

It is advisable to cover the cost of municipal waste management by charging fees. The “user pays” principle should be part of any such fee system. In the economically advanced European countries, the cost of an adequate waste management system is in the order of one percent of the disposable household income. The cost of waste collection is usually higher than cost of treatment (a typical cost split is ⅔ for collection, ⅓ for treatment). Typical European treatment costs can be taken from Fig. 15.

Landfill taxes are proven instruments to support the “3 R” principle i.e. they provide financial disincentives to waste disposal and, at the same time, incentives for resource recovery. The survey in the member states of the Council has shown that such taxes (or levies) are already implemented in several countries (details in the paragraph on economic issues).

As an example, Austria introduced a landfill levy in the early nineties, with a gradual increase in the levy to currently 87 €/t for untreated waste disposed to landfill. This is likely to be the highest waste disposal levy worldwide and has significantly contributed to a range of alternatives such as recycling and waste treatment. Landfill levies represent a useful element of any contemporary solid waste management system (refer Fig. 16). One of the key issues surrounding waste levies is the question of whether the money raised should be used to fund alternative recycling and waste management systems or to complement general government revenue.

The continuing reduction (minimisation) of waste quantities requiring landfill disposal remains to be the key objective of sustainable waste management. In addition waste disposal levies, a number of actions need to be implemented to achieve this goal.

v. What needs to be done?

Following a review of waste management in all member states of the Council of Europe, it is recommended that some minimum standards be implemented with respect to waste handling.

These minimum standards should include the following:

1. Occupational health & safety requirements:

• No bare handed operation with any sort of refuse during collection and treatment / disposal;

• No scavenging at landfill sites without suitable work protection and regular health control.

2. Collection systems:

• Installation of regular waste collection systems for all urban, suburban and regional areas (exceptions should only be granted for remote residences where occupants can prove to have a safe individual waste disposal facility);

• Integration of phased targets for the availability of municipal waste collection systems into relevant legal framework (eg. EC Directive No 1999/31: 70 % availability in 2008; 95 % in 2010).

3. Waste disposal standards:

• Landfills need to be fenced and patrolled;

• Wastes accepted at the landfill must be recorded;

• Waste placed in the landfill needs to be regularly covered with suitable material (eg. construction debris) in order to reduce odour, windblown litter and vermin;

• Adjacent groundwater bodies must be monitored;

• Suitable measures for groundwater protection (such as landfill liners and leachate collection) need to be in place.

III.  Solid waste – a survey in the member states of the Council of Europe

i. General remarks on the information request

Data was gathered from the national governments of all member states of the Council of Europe via a questionnaire. The information requested herein focuses on structural-political aspects rather than on figures and “hard facts”. The present initiative is to be understood as a supplement to databases which are regularly updated and published by various sources ⁵. Therefore, the definitions used herein follow a more "pragmatic" approach, e. g. the term “Municipal Solid Waste” (MSW) refers to material that is being disposed. It does not include separately collected materials as in recognized statistical methodologies.

Despite the foregoing, certain overlaps with other initiatives could not be avoided when requesting information from various national sources. Nevertheless, the high feedback – in terms of number of countries having participated in the survey, but moreover the quality of submitted data – reveals that the approach of this initiative points in the right direction.

At the end of January 2006, the Secretariat of the Committee on the Environment, Agriculture and Local and Regional Affairs submitted the information request to the Council of Europe member states ⁶. Between 15 February and 29 May, replies from 29 member states were received and evaluated. In four cases (Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro which was a national entity when the request was issued, and the United Kingdom) the responses reflected the internal political situation of these states: For the UK one national authority replied for five political “sub-entities” (England, Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Gibraltar). Other members’ responses were received (or not) from the relevant authority of the existing ‘sub-entities’.

Fig. 11:       The member states of the Council of Europe –

grouped by participation/non-participation in the survey

Fig. 12:       Survey responses

Fig. 12 illustrates that a population weighted survey response rate of 55 % was achieved. By number of countries, the response rate was about two thirds. This indicates that smaller countries were more likely to cooperate than larger countries ⁷: Indeed, if the Russian Federation, Ukraine, France and Italy – all amongst the six largest member states by population had participated then the survey would have covered about 93 % of the total population.

In addition to the above it is noted that the response rate from EU member states was higher than that of other countries.

Another aspect is the quality of the responses. The responses of the new EU members were particularly carefully prepared. In terms of quality of responses – accuracy, completeness, plausibility of data, real compilation rather than only referring to websites, providing additional information – the top ten countries are (alphabetical order): Austria, Belgium (Flanders Region), Bulgaria, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Lithuania, Slovenia, and the United Kingdom.

“The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” has sent back a blank questionnaire (except for the details of the agency involved). For a certain group of countries ⁸ the response rate was generally low and provided information scarce and incomplete.

This observation is interesting and can be seen as a first outcome of the survey: most of the requested information should be available in these countries because a lot of assistance has been provided by the EU as well as by other international organisations and development agencies; assistance in the form of Institutional Strenghtening programs, Technical Assistance addressing precisely the issues asked for in the survey. For whatever reasons the capacity of national authorities (and, probably even more so, regional agencies) who should cope with “What happens with our waste?”-questions seems not to correspond with the input which was provided over the last decade.

ii. Results of the survey

This report provides an overview of the key findings of the survey.

a) Political responsibility, documentation tasks and planning aspects

The question on clear political accountability (“Are MSW related issues assigned to one single Ministry on national level?”) showed the results below (figures in this and in the following graphs show countries i.e. “political entities”, not population):

In the majority of the countries (57%) only one ministry is responsible for solid waste related issues. Note that countries like Belgium and Bosnia and Herzegovina with their separate internal political entities have slightly distorted the result: The question says “national level” hence their correct answer regarding one single Ministry was “no”.

25 years ago the distribution would have been significantly different: Waste was a matter that was dealt with – if at all – partially by Public Health, partially by Water, partially by Mining, and partially by Public Affairs agencies.

The answers to the next two questions,

“Is there an Agency (national level) dealing with MSW issues?”

and “Is there a National Plan on Municipal Solid Waste?”

showed an even clearer result. The five entities without a National Plan on MSW are Monaco, Gibraltar, two Caucasian states (Azerbaijan and Georgia) where aspects related to environment still enjoy a much lower political attention compared to Central Europe (the more their cooperation in this initiative is to be acclaimed), and Turkey, which reports that a MSW strategy is currently being prepared as part of a National Environmental Strategy.

The question on regular documentation, “Are MSW amounts reported regularly (i.e. at least annually) to an institution at national level?”

revealed that information on waste quantities as an essential basis for any planning is available in most countries, at least to a certain extent.

Planning generally entails the setting (and controlling!) of targets. The responses to the relevant question “Does this Plan contain time targets regarding the reduction of MSW, or fractions of it?”

reveal that not only EU member states (with obligations such as to reduce biodegradable municipal waste components significantly over time) pursue such goals. (A number of less than 37 evaluated data sets - as in the questions so far - is explained by the fact that a country / entity having available no National Plan on MSW cannot report respective targets.)

The question for EU members “When does your country have to achieve the "first" time target regarding the reduction of biodegradable municipal waste according to EC Directive 1999/31 ("Landfill Directive")?” yielded the following result:

Slovenia declared that it might be unlikely to meet the given time target for reduction of biodegradable municipal waste within this year.

b)       Amounts

Fig. 13 shows quantities of MSW plus separately collected materials per capita. The extremely high values reported by Liechtenstein and Monaco can be explained with a high economic activity plus an unknown number of non-residents / floating population which is not registered in these countries. The remaining values make evident that countries with long-established waste management systems show higher portions of separately collected materials compared to the countries in the right third of the graph.

Fig. 13: Result of the information request: “Quantities of MSW, recyclables and compostables”

c) Collection and disposal standards

The questions

“Is there a National Regulation on MSW collection?

and “Is there a National Regulation on MSW treatment & disposal ?”

provided similar results. Knowing about certain shortcomings in less developed countries (eg. absence of regular collection schemes, particularly in rural areas), the related request “Estimated quantity of MSW which gets regularly collected” was of high interest.

Fig. 14 shows the result, with the exception of Ireland and Sweden (where remote areas might practice with some well organized, technically appropriate “self disposal”). All values below 95 % have been reported by countries from Eastern and South Eastern Europe. It has to be noticed that the figures represent a country-wide average: Rural areas in these regions might suffer from values down to zero which consequently means that waste disposal happens in a quite “informal” way with all the negative impacts on humans and the environment: Setting waste loads at fire in the open, dumping in watercourses, in forests and alongside streets, etc.

Fig. 14:        Result of the information request “Estimated quantity of MSW which gets regularly collected” (“MSW Collection grade”)

The result of the request “Estimated quantity of MSW which gets disposed of at approved, engineered & monitored facilities”. Fig. 15 points in the same direction.

Fig. 15:        Result of the information request “Estimated quantity of MSW which gets disposed of at approved, engineered & monitored facilities”

The evaluation of the question “Is there joint disposal in neighbouring countries?” resulted in three “yes”: Andorra and Liechtenstein form disposal partnerships with their large neighbours (Andorra with Spain, Liechtenstein with Switzerland), which makes good sense for small countries of this size. Finland reported to maintain some cooperation in waste disposal with Norway and Sweden.

Responses to the question

“MSW treatment technology is predominantly...

shows that 40 % of the countries have to rely on imported technology, about a quarter is self-sufficient.

The related question

“Does your country export MSW treatment and disposal technology?”

shows the result that only a small portion of European countries is exporting technology related to waste treatment.

d) Economic issues

Fig. 16:        Result of the information request
“Range of typical disposal costs for MSW (collection excluded)”

Fig. 17:        Result of the information request

“Data on landfill levies (on municipal or national level)”

Main outcome of requested information on economics (Fig. 16 & 17) reflects in the upper graph the higher technical standards on solid waste treatment and disposal applied in Western and Central Europe.

The lower graph reveals that landfill levies as an economical steering tool (in order to foster treatment prior to landfilling) get applied at present only in EU member states, and by and large only in higher developed waste management systems (Germany is to be seen as a clear exception in this respect).

The example of Austria (Fig. 18), which introduced a landfill levy in the early nineties (with today 87 €/t for untreated waste on landfills it can be regarded as the highest value worldwide), shows that landfill levies potentially represent a useful element of an up-to-date solid waste management system.

Fig. 18:        The example of Austria: Timewise development of waste amounts to be disposed of (black and grey columns) and separately collected materials

IV.       Conclusions

A proper dealing with solid waste represents a main pillar of far-sighted, sustainable environmental management, and politics. Insufficient management of municipal waste results in considerable health hazards and supplementary costs in both the short and long term.

The member states of the Council of Europe show significant differences in respect to solid waste management standards and practices. Countries without minimum standards in respect to solid waste management face negative impacts on their economic development (with tourism industry as first indicator). It is therefore recommended that a number of minimum standards with respect to waste handling be implemented. The recommendations below should be taken into consideration:

1. Occupational health & safety requirements: No bare handed operation with any sort of refuse during collection and treatment / disposal, no scavenging at landfill sites without suitable work protection and regular health control;

2. Collection systems: Installation of regular waste collection systems for all urban, suburban and regional areas (exceptions should only be granted for remote residences where occupants can prove to have a safe individual waste disposal facility). Integration of phased targets for the availability of municipal waste collection systems into relevant legal framework (EC Directive N^o 1999/31);

3. Waste disposal standards: Landfills need to be fenced and patrolled. Wastes accepted at the landfill must be recorded. Waste placed in the landfill needs to be regularly covered with suitable material (eg. construction debris) in order to reduce odour, windblown litter and vermin. Adjacent groundwater bodies must be monitored. Depending on local hydrogeologics suitable measures for groundwater protection (such as landfill liners and leachate collection) need to be in place;

4. Waste management planning: Waste management strategies should contain a stepwise reduction/phase-out of landfilling of specific waste streams, related to their recyclability and/or impacts caused by their disposal (e.g. biodegradable waste);

5. Institutional: The institutional level which shall be responsible for the management of wastes from households, commercial activities, institutions, and construction and demolition activities is the municipality. Municipalities which are too small to provide the relevant services should be contracted to Regional Associations.

* * *

Reporting committee: Committee on the Environment, Agriculture and Local and Regional Affairs

Reference to committee: Doc. 10519, Reference No. 3097 of 6 June 2005

Draft resolution adopted unanimously by the committee on 24 January 2007

Members of the Committee: Mr Walter Schmied (Chairman), Mr Alan Meale (1^e Vice-Chairman), Ms Elsa Papadimitriou (2^nd Vice-Chairperson), Mr Pasquale Nessa (3^rd Vice-Chairman), Mr Ruhi Açikgöz, Mr Toomas Alatalu, Mr Gerolf Annemans, Mr Ivo Banac (alternate: Mr Miljenco Dorić), Mr Tommaso Barbato, Mr Rony Bargetze, Mr Jean-Marie Bockel, Mr Mauro Chiaruzzi, Mrs Pikria Chikhradze, Mr Valeriu Cosarciuc, Mr Osman Coşkunoğlu, Mr Alain Cousin, Mr Taulant Dedja, Mr Hubert Deittert, Mr Tomasz Dudziński (alternate: Mr Dariusz Lipiński), Mr József Ékes, Mr Bill Etherington, Mr Nigel Evans, Mr Ivàn Farkas, Mr Adolfo Fernández Aguilar, Mr György Frunda, Ms Eva Garcia Pastor, Mr Peter Götz, Mr Vladimir Grachev (alternate: Mr Valeriy Sudarenkov), Mr Kristiin Gunnarsson, Ms Lena Hallengren, Mr Poul Henrik Hedeboe, Mr Rafael Huseynov, Mr Stanislaw Huskowski, Mr Jean Huss, Mr Fazail Ibrahimli (alternate: Ms Aynur Guliyeva), Mr Ilie Ilaşcu, Mr Mustafa IIicali, Mrs Fatme Ilyaz (alternate: Mr Zahari Georgiev), Mr Ivan Ivanov, Mr Bjørn Jacobsen, Mr Gediminas Jakavonis, Mrs Danuta Jazłowiecka, Mrs Liana Kanelli, Mr Karen Karapetyan, Mr Victor Kolesnikov, Mr Gerhard Kurzmann, Mr Ewald Lindinger, Mr François Loncle (alternate: Mr Jean-François Le Grand), Ms Kerstin Lungren, Mr.Theo Maissen, Mr José Mendes Bota (alternate: Mr Abilio Dias Fernandes), Mrs Maria Manuela de Melo, Mr Gilbert Meyer (alternate: Mr Daniel Goulet), Mr Vladimir Mokry (alternate: Ms Svetlana Smirnova), Mr Stefano Morselli, Mr Žarko Obradović, Mr Pieter Omtzigt (alternate: Mr Leo Platvoet), Ms Gordana Pop Lazić, Mr Ivan Popescu, Mr Cezar Florin Preda, Mr Jakob Presečnik, Mr Lluís Maria de Puig, Mr Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando, Mrs Adoración Quesada (alternate: Mr Iñaki Txueka Isasti), Mr Dario Rivolta, Ms Anta Rugāte, Mr Fidias Sarikas, Hermann Scheer (alternate: Mr Detlef Dzembritzki), Mr Ladislav Skopal, Mr Christophe Spiliotis-Saquet, Mr Rainder Steenblock, Mr Vilmos Szabó, Mr Kimmo Tiilikainen, Mr Nikolay Tulaev, Mr Victor Tykhonov, Mr Tomas Ulehla, Mr Geert Versnick, Mr Rudolf Vis, Mr Harm Evert Waalkens, Mr Klaus Wittauer, Mr G.V. Wright, Mr Mykola Yankovsky, Mr Blagoj Zašov.

N.B.       The names of those members present at the meeting are printed in bold.

Secretariat to the Committee: Mr Alfred Sixto, Mr Bogdan Torcătoriu and Mrs Marine Trévisan

¹ The Rapporteur would like to thank Mr Martin Steiner, TBU Environmental Engineering Consultants Ltd (Austria), for his invaluable contribution in the preparation and drawing up of this report.

² It usually comprises – no matter if in separately collected streams or in wastes to be disposed of - kitchen & garden waste, paper and part of textiles and “fines” wherever classified as such.

³ Fig. 5: “Burning plastic waste in your stove damages the chimney of your house and your children’s lungs!”

⁴ Fig. 6: The high values for glass and kitchen waste in the given example clearly indicate to separately collect these two fractions which usually are the main “valuables” in waste generated in tourism structures.

⁵ such as EUROSTAT or the UN Statistics Division:

“Waste generated and treated Europe (data 1995 – 2003)”, published by the European Commission (Eurostat), Office of Official Publications of the European Communities, 2005, ISBN 92-894-9996-6

“Environmental Indicators – Waste – Municipal Waste Treatment” published by the UN Statistics Division under http://unstats.un.org/unsd/environment/wastetreatment.htm

⁶ the survey itself considered Montenegro (short form: CG) and Serbia (SR) already as individual countries.

⁷ The average population figure of the member states is represented by the Netherlands when calculating the arithmetic average (16,7 million) respectively Denmark or Slovakia when calculating the median average (5,4 million). The median does not take into account the biggest and smallest value of a sample thus giving a better “typical value” of an unevenly distributed universe.

⁸ Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro, “The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia” and Albania