... web site http://www.biowaste.eu

30% to 45% of municipal solid waste is biowaste today

Biowaste accounts for 30 % to 45 % of municipal solid waste across Europe. In June 2009, European Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas stated that «The EU needs to become a resource-efficient, recycling society and bio-waste offers great opportunities. Once our resources become waste we must find ways to recycle them. Energy recovery from bio-waste in the form of biogas or thermal energy will help in the fight against climate change, and quality compost can contribute greatly to healthy soil and biodiversity. We need to work with stakeholders to ensure that the waste management options we choose bring the greatest benefit to our environment».

The need for decreasing the biodegradable part of the waste going to landfills

The main environmental threat from biowaste is the production of methane in landfills, which accounted for some 3% of total greenhouse gas emissions in the EU-15 in 1995. The Landfill Directive 1999/31/EC obliges Member States to reduce the amount of biodegradable waste that they landfill to 35% of 1995 levels by 2016, which will significantly reduce the problem. The Commission's priority is to ensure that Member States comply with this legal requirement fully and on time.

The Member States have a number of choices that they can take in terms of alternative treatment for this biodegradable waste, taking into account local conditions such as climatic conditions to the composition of the collected biowaste.

One potential option is composting. Actions that need to be taken at the EU level to promote composting include the definition of quality standards for compost so that markets for compost can develop. The European Commission, together with stakeholders, has started working on standards since 2007. The setting up of standards on compost will be a means of helping the Member States to overcome one of the biggest obstacles to composting policies, i.e. the lack of user confidence and market acceptance.

The consultation phase

The first step in that process has been the Green Paper on the Management of Bio-waste in the published last year 2008 (Green Paper on the Management of Bio-waste in the EU and Working document accompanying the Green Paper).

Following this discussion paper, contributions were sent by mid-March 2009 to the European Commission.

The second step is the preparation of an Impact Assessment of a potential legislative proposal. The general objective of this activity is to look into ways of improving the way in which bio-waste is managed in the EU, and to provide an appropriate assessment of policy options, including the environmental, economic and social impacts, as well as prospective risks/opportunities.

Presentations of «Biowaste - Need for EU legislation?» here: http://www.biowaste.eu

Learn more about European legal framework on: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/waste/compost/index.htm