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Indicator Fact Sheet Signals 2001– Chapter

Biodegradable waste in

W4a: Biodegradable Municipal Waste landfilled as percentage of total generation of Biodegradable Municipal Waste in 1995.

Landfill Directive target indicator

120

Target 2006 - 75 % 100 Target 2006 - 75 % ercentage of the 80 1995 TargetTarget 2016 2016 - 35 - 35 % % 60 ion in

40 generat 20

0 The France Norway Catalonia Ireland

Biodegradable waste landfilled as p as landfilled waste Biodegradable

1995 1996 1997 1998

Note: The reference year is 1995, although data for refers to 1993, Finland 1994, Greece 1997, Italy 1996 and 1994. Biodegradable waste includes , paperboard, and garden waste.

Source: ETC/W questionnaire on biodegradable municipal waste and OECD/Eurostat Questionnaire 1998.

L Too much biodegradable municipal waste goes to landfills. There have been no improvements in the countries that make the most use of landfilling.

1 Results and assessment

Relevance for development in the environment The landfilling of Biodegradable Municipal Waste (BMW) is of environmental concern because its decomposition results in the production of and emissions and because a potentially valuable resource is being wasted. By diverting BMW away from landfill to and recovery operations such as composting, and material recycling, a valuable resource can be produced from the waste, and the exploitation of virgin resources and the amount of land required for landfill can be reduced.

Policy reference Council Directive 1999/31/EC of 26 April 1999 on the landfill of waste sets, as a policy target, the phased reduction of BMW going to landfill. . By 2006, Member States are restricted to landfilling a maximum of 75 % of the total amount by weight of BMW produced in 1995. This target increases to 50 % in 2009 and 35 % in 2016. Countries that landfilled more than 80 % of BMW produced in 1995 may postpone the attainment of these targets for a maximum of four years.

Assessment

Countries can be grouped into: • those that are currently landfilling less than 35% of BMW produced (Denmark, , The Netherlands and the Flemish region of ); • those that are currently landfilling between 35% and 75% of BMW produced (France, Finland, Norway, Germany and Italy); • those that are currently landfilling more than 75% of BMW produced (Spain, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Greece and Portugal).

Initial trends for countries with relatively high landfilling rates that reported information for both 1995 and 1998 indicate that Italy and Norway are moving in the right direction while the United Kingdom, Ireland Finland are experiencing growth in relative quantities of BMW landfilled. Trends in Luxembourg, Sweden, Germany, Spain, Greece and Portugal could not be assessed, due to an absence of information for the years since 1995.

The places an absolute target on the tonnage of BMW that can be landfilled by 2006, 2009 and 2016 by linking the quantity permitted to the quantity produced in 1995. This means, for instance, that if BMW production doubles between 1995 and 2016, only 17,5 % of BMW produced in 2016 can be landfilled.

A key potential barrier, therefore, to meeting the targets set by the Directive is the continuing growth in the production of municipal waste. Countries need to plan for this and ensure that adequate recovery capacity (e.g. composting, anaerobic digestion, material recycling, energy recovery etc.) is available for the increasing quantities of waste that will require diversion away from landfill. This applies to all countries, including those with currently low landfill rates.

According to a study by the ETC/W approximately 107 million tonnes of BMW (paper, paperboard, food and garden waste) was produced in the EEU plus Norway in 1995, of which 70 million tonnes (66 %) was landfilled. As illustrated above, there is large variation from one country to another. These variations are mainly a function of differences in approaches to . Generally, countries that have high levels of separate collection also have high levels of BMW recovery and low levels of BMW disposal to

2 landfill. Recovery practice also varies from country to country with some countries more heavily reliant on with energy recovery than others.

A key conclusion of the ETC/W study is that an integrated package of options is needed at national level to achieve high diversion rates. An integrated approach must start with separate collection of materials so that relatively uncontaminated materials are available for subsequent recovery. It is also important that recovery options be linked clearly to available markets and outlets for materials diverted away from landfill, because there is little point in separating and collecting material for which neither a market nor an outlet exists.

Meta data:

Technical Information 1. Data sources: Eurostat: “Waste Generated in Europe”. Luxembourg 2000. Based on: OECD/Eurostat questionnaire 1998, ETCW: “Topic report on Biodegradable Municipal Waste in Europe”. Copenhagen September 2000 (draft publication). 2. Description of data: Official reports from Member States. 3. Geographical coverage: EU plus Norway. 4. Temporal coverage: The reference year is 1995 although data for Germany refers to 1993, Finland 1994, Greece 1997, Italy 1996 and Sweden 1994. 5. Methodology and frequency: Joint OECD/Eurostat questionnaire with some limited guidelines and definitions is send to OECD-members every second year. In addition ETC/W has send a specific BMW questionnaire to the EEA member states. Methodology of data manipulation: The outset for the Landfill Directive is Eurostat figures on Municipal Waste on landfills 1995 or latest year available.

The data on BMW landfilled is based on information reported by countries to ETC/W. Where information was not available from the ETC/W survey, OECD/Eurostat estimates were used.

Quality information 7. Strengths and weaknesses: Some member countries did not report information on the total amounts of biodegradable municipal waste produced or their management routes. In these cases OECD/Eurostat estimates were used. 8. There is limited monitoring of BMW going to landfills. Monitoring at this point would be more precise than the estimate. 9. Statistical improvement needed. The proposed Council Regulation on Waste Management Statistics will provide some of the necessary statistical improvement for this indicator but data will only be collected every three years. Each country should be capable of describing the flow of BMW, i.e., the quantity produced and its fate (i.e. how much is recycled, incinerated and landfilled).

3 Data.

Biodegradable municipal waste for EU + Norway Country/Region Baseline year Latest year Year BMW BMW Year BMW Produced Landfilled Landfilled Ktonnes Ktonnes Ktonnes Austria 1995 1,495 302 1996 322 Belgium1 19952 4,055 2,132 Belgium (Flanders) 1995 1,671 623 1998 322 Denmark 1995 1,813 205 1998 106 Finland 1994 1,664 928 1997 1,155 France 1995 15,746 5,988 1998 6,742 Germany1 1993 28,700 12,000 - - Baden Württemburg 1995 5,859 2,502 1998 1,705 Greece1 1997 2,688 2,688 - - Ireland 1995 990 903 1998 1,049 Italy 1996 9,170 6,821 1998 6,586 Luxembourg1 1995 160 34 - - Norway 1995 1,572 1,069 1997 915 Portugal1 1995 3,301 3,301 - - Spain1 1995 11,633 8,823 - - Catalonia 1995 1,984 1,481 1998 1,536 Sweden1 1994 2,656 956 - - The Netherlands3 1995 4,830 1,365 1998 700 U.Kingdom4 1996/97 16,366 14,675 98/99 15,250 Total 106,839* 70,338* - *) Excluding Flanders, Baden Württemburg and Catalonia 1) Source Eurostat 2) Figures relate to 1995 and earlier years, due to separate data collection for Flanders, Walloon and Brussels. 3) Figures relate to waste from households only. 4) England and only

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