[prakruti] How Flanders deals with its waste - Hindu/Guardian

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At 04:25 AM 9/28/07, you wrote:

>AVShenoy <av_shenoy

>[prakruti] How Flanders deals with its waste - Hindu/Guardian

>Sanjay Ubale <sanjayubale,

> ...snip... Prakruti <prakruti >

>

>

>Date:27/09/2007 URL:

>http://www.thehindu.com/2007/09/27/stories/2007092756141300.htm

>

>Opinion - News Analysis

>

>How Flanders deals with its waste

>Sophie Unwin

>Its initiatives — from rubbish charges to keeping chickens — are

>dramatically cutting waste

>

>Prosperity has come at a price in Belgium. As affluence has grown, so has

>the country’s waste mountain — a problem that all governments are finding

>increasingly hard to ignore.

>However, the region of Flanders in Belgium claims to have found a

>solution, and the world’s waste authorities are beating a path to its

>door. Since 2005, its population has increased and the region has got

>richer, but the total amount of waste generated has stayed the same. In

>economists’ terms, Flanders has “decoupled” waste from economic growth,

>and delegations from Russia, China and the United Kingdom have all been

>there recently to find out how they have done it.

>Britain is particularly interested. U.K. figures for household waste are

>roughly comparable with those of Flanders, but there are startling

>differences: Flanders’ recycling rates of 72 per cent in rural areas and

>over 60 per cent in urban areas are among the highest in the world,

>dwarfing England’s 28 per cent.

>One small part of the answer was last week strutting around the suburban

>garden of Vigoreux Aime, 71. He proudly showed off his chickens — red and

>black bantams and white leghorns that he keeps for the eggs. He says:

>“They eat everything — grass cuttings too wet for the compost, and they

>even love bones.”

>The chickens are part of Flanders’ system of taxes and incentives to

>reduce its waste mountain. The public waste agency, Ovam, has allowed

>local authorities to introduce subsidies for a range of waste prevention

>measures — from compost bins, to chickens and reuse centres.

>At the spotless civic amenity centre in Ghent, the waste categories are

>organised into dozens of disposal units. There is one for batteries, one

>for chip pan oil (which will eventually be used as vehicle fuel), and

>others for furniture, paper, wood and cans. There is even a place where

>dead pets can be brought for cremation.

>And Flanders is well down the track of getting people to pay for what they

>waste — the system Britain is considering. Under the current system, Ghent

>citizens can make up to 24 free separate visits a year to drop off their

>bulky waste. Other recyclable goods are collected for free on separate

>well-publicised days for each type of material. But households have to pay

>to dispose of the waste they do not recycle. In Ghent, the price is €1.30

>a sack for any rubbish that cannot be recycled.

>Flanders can avoid land-filling largely because it burns most of its

>waste. The local incinerator in Ghent, next to Ovam’s offices, was

>refurbished in 1996 and takes 1,00,000 tonnes of waste a year. Last year,

>it started to recover energy as steam, using it to heat the university

>hospital 1 km away, via a pipeline. Flanders’ planning laws, designed to

>phase out landfill, do place strict limits and quality standards on

>incineration. But while Ghent has a state-of-the-art “energy from waste

>plant,” incineration is still considered controversial by environment

>groups and there is no avoiding that there are problems with it.

>Ovam’s taxes and local authority subsidies are the extension of the

>principle that the polluter pays. Landfill is taxed at €75 a tonne, while

>incineration is taxed at just under €7. When the scheme was introduced 10

>years ago, waste fell by 30 per cent.

>Paul Dobbelaere, general manager of Ivago, the public-private partnership

>that manages the waste — recyclable and not — of the 2,50,000 people of

>Ghent and its neighbour Destelbergen, says: “You have to be sure you pick

>up all the waste. Once that’s achieved, you must find an outlet for

>everything you collect.”

>Constant demand

>Mr. Dobbelaere counters the suggestion that the new incinerator that heats

>the hospital could increase waste figures because of its constant demand

>for rubbish. It always runs to full capacity, he says, but the city only

>supplies 60 per cent of its waste. This way, Ivago can earn an income from

>companies that pay to dispose of their waste — the remaining 40 per cent.

>Ivago says people have bought into the whole recycling waste system, and

>the authorities have communicated the recycling scheme well — not just

>what they collect, and when, but in leaflets that explain why.

>The people of Ghent, it seems, are mostly impressed. “It was so good it

>meant the council got re-elected,” says chocolatier Mia Ackaert.

>What has proved more difficult has been reaching the poorer communities in

>the city centre. Recycling rates are lower here, at 62 per cent. A

>government law means that Ovam is allowed to communicate only in Flemish,

>which makes it hard to reach the many different immigrant communities.

>With high-rise blocks, it is difficult to tell who is responsible for

>which waste, so some of the central chutes down which people used to throw

>unsorted rubbish have been blocked up by Ivago.

>Another scheme flourishing in Ghent is the Kringwinkel chain of “reuse”

>stores, in which goods are dismantled and repaired. Rows of washing

>machines and fridges sit next to stripped-off components such as computer

>cables. The white goods come with six-month guarantees. “Everything can be

>reused,” says the manager, Els Dujen. “There is demand for everything we

>supply — if it’s priced appropriately.”

>This year’s long-awaited U.K. waste strategy set for the first time

>important targets to decrease residual waste — “the amount of waste not

>recycled, reused or composted.” What has been harder, in the U.K. and in

>Flanders, has been trying to prevent the waste generated in the first

>place. — © Guardian Newspapers Limited, 2007

>(Sophie Unwin writes for the Ends Report environmental policy journal.)

>© Copyright 2000 - 2007 The Hindu

 

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