While the Catalan Waste Agency has been successfully implementing and applying separate waste collection in the region, reaching 40% of waste being separately collected, biowaste collection still poses as a challenge and Mr Giro i Fontanals tells us why is it like that and what could be the solution.
The director of the strategic planning area of the Catalan Waste Agency (ARC) proudly shares the regions achievements in the field of separate collection which dates back to the beginning of 90’s. “Thanks to laws and strategic plans we have improved the waste management of municipal solid waste we managed to reach 40% of waste being separately collected”, he explained ad added “the new programme states the target of 60% for the entire country”. 400 000 t of biowaste per year is treated in Catalonia which results in an annual production of around 70 000 t of compost. Most of it classified as A or B (highest quality) according to the Spanish standards.
The current waste management plan and services enable 7.5 million Catalans to take part in this biowaste collection schemes or in terms of municipalities – 800 out of 948. As Mf Giro i Fontalans explained, most of these municipalities implemented different systems and approaches; some of them use exclusively home composting, due to certain characteristics and circumstances, why some municipalities apply a combined approach, combining home composting and separate biowaste collection. However, Mr Giro i Fontanals shared one concern, too: “Although our services cover separate collection of biowaste in most of the municipalities, the real participation is only 1/3 of the population and this poses the question why not all the beneficiaries use the provided separate collection”. As he explained, the reason behind this could be the fact that probably most of the locals can’t see the benefits for themselves or the community they belong to. This is where the DECISIVE project comes in. “So, this project like some other projects we do, will try to make visible all the benefits to the citizens”, he explained. He also clarified that this sensibilisation is easier when using decentralised systems, as the treatment is closer to the place of biowaste generation, as well as the final output and its utilisation, whether it was biogas or compost.