2003 EDITION Waste generated and treated in Europe Data 1990-2001 THEME 8 Environment EUROPEAN and DETAILED TABLES DETAILED COMMISSION 8energy Europe Direct is a service to help you find answers to your questions about the European Union New freephone number: 00 800 6 7 8 9 10 11 A great deal of additional information on the European Union is available on the Internet. It can be accessed through the Europa server (http://europa.eu.int). Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2003 ISBN 92-894-6355-4 © European Communities, 2003 Acknowledgements: This publication was prepared under the responsibility of Rainer Muthmann, Head of Unit E5, Environment and sustainable development, Eurostat Publication editors: Karin Jordan, Eurostat Christian Heidorn, Eurostat Consultants: Marta de Medina Rosales Thierry Leroy National Statistical Institutes: We would like to thank all the colleagues from the National Statistical Institutes that have contributed with information. Further information: Karin Jordan Tel.: ++ 352 4301 32308 Fax: ++ 352 4301 30039 E-mail: [email protected] Christian Heidorn Tel.: ++ 352 4301 35271 Fax: ++ 352 4301 30039 E-mail: [email protected] The views expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the European Commission. 4 Waste generated and treated in Europe Table of contents Summary......................................................................................................................................... 6 1 Introduction.......................................................................................................................... 7 2 Total waste generated......................................................................................................... 8 2.1 Overview......................................................................................................................... 8 2.2 Breakdown by main sector ............................................................................................. 9 3 Industrial waste ................................................................................................................... 10 3.1 Industrial waste by country ............................................................................................. 10 3.2 Industrial waste by branch .............................................................................................. 12 4 Municipal Waste .................................................................................................................. 16 4.1 Amounts of municipal and household waste collected ................................................... 17 4.2 Composition of municipal waste ..................................................................................... 19 4.3 Type of collection of municipal waste ............................................................................. 21 4.4 Management of municipal waste: treatment and disposal ............................................. 23 5 Hazardous waste ................................................................................................................. 26 5.1 Generation of hazardous waste...................................................................................... 26 5.2 Management of hazardous waste: Treatment and disposal........................................... 29 6 Recycling and Packaging ................................................................................................... 32 6.1 Recycling ........................................................................................................................ 32 6.2 Packaging ....................................................................................................................... 34 Annex List of figures ................................................................................................................................... 36 List of tables..................................................................................................................................... 38 Community Legislation .................................................................................................................... 39 Basel Convention, list of waste streams.......................................................................................... 41 Environment 2010, Our future, our choice....................................................................................... 42 Main elements of EU Waste Management Strategy ....................................................................... 43 Abbreviations and symbols.............................................................................................................. 45 Data tables and footnotes................................................................................................................ 46 ff Waste generated and treated in Europe SUMMARY The purpose of this publication is to offer a set Overall structure of industry cannot explain of official European statistics on waste, which such a high difference, given that this are relevant for Community action on the difference is also observed at the level of each environment, providing the basic data required sector. for the assessment of the environmental impact of waste generation and management. Municipal waste, presented in section 4, is the category of waste on which the best After an introductory section describing the information is collected. Data and figures show general framework of the report, the statistical a tendency for the amounts of municipal waste source and the methodology applied, results generated to increase. Municipal waste are presented in sections 2 to 6. Annexed generated by households was around 456 kg tables include time series for Western Europe1, per capita in Western Europe and about 200 kg Eastern Europe Candidate Countries2 as well in Eastern Europe. as Malta and Cyprus. However, due to poor data availability, it has not been possible to Separate collection of certain kinds of waste show a complete set for countries and (packaging in particular) is growing, but this indicators. method of collection is not equally used among the countries: for instance, less than 5% of Section 2 deals with the total amounts of municipal waste are collected separately in waste generated in Europe, broken down by Portugal, but over 65% in Austria. main sources: about 2.2 billion tons of waste has been generated annually in Europe In 8 out of 18 Western European Countries, between 1998 and 2001. landfill continues to be a rather common practice but incineration is increasing and in However, these 2.2 billion should not be taken recent years recovery showed an important indistinctly, as the management of agricultural increase. In Eastern European Candidate waste (mostly biodegradable) for instance is Countries, landfill is the dominant way of not at all equivalent to that of hazardous waste managing municipal waste and the only produced by the metal or chemical industries. method in Bulgaria, Cyprus, Lithuania, The construction sector contributes the most to Romania and Slovakia. waste generation in Western and Eastern Europe, followed by agriculture and by ‘mining Section 5 presents statistics on generation and and quarrying’ sectors. This information should management of hazardous waste. A rough not be taken at face value, notably since the estimate shows that more than 36 million countries interpret waste from agriculture tonnes of hazardous waste has been differently. generated in Western Europe between 1997 and 2001. In Eastern Europe, it has amounted Section 3 explains in more detail the more than to 15 million tonnes. generation of waste by manufacturing industry. The largest European waste producing Finally, section 6 relates to recycling and industries are the basic metal industries, packaging. Around 18% of municipal waste followed by the food, beverages and tobacco collected in Western Europe has been producers and by the manufacturing of other collected for recycling. On average, among four non-metallic mineral products. selected packaging waste streams generated (paper, glass, plastics and metals), paper Eastern Europe countries produced relatively packing is dominating (45%). much more industrial waste than Western Europe: 953 kg per thousand € of value added against 177 kg. _____________________________________________________ 1 The EU-15 Countries, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland 2 Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Turkey. 6 Waste generated and treated in Europe 1 Introduction During the last decades, waste generation has With the implementation of the Regulation on become a serious problem for our highly Waste Statistics it will be possible to build up a industrialised societies. Waste volumes have more complete picture on waste generation persistently grown faster than GDP. and treatment, not only in relation to the whole economy but also at the different points of the The 6th Environmental Action Programme calls waste stream, including trans-border for a number of inter-related measures movements. designed to reduce the environmental impacts of resource use in line with the ‘Community Eurostat did not carry out any estimations of Strategy for a Sustainable Development’. missing data at national level. However, some aggregates have been estimated for Western "Ensuring the sustainable