Separate plastic collection: standards defined with disposal companies
In the canton of Zurich, there are only a few separate collections of mixed plastic waste from households. The reason: separate collection only makes sense if the material is properly recycled. Now the canton has defined standards together with plastic disposal companies. Municipalities can demand compliance with the standards from the disposal companies and thus be sure that separate collection makes ecological sense.
© Depositphotos, Robertobintti70
More than ten percent of the waste in an average garbage bag consists of plastic. The starting material for plastic production is petroleum, a non-renewable raw material. Although the incineration of plastic waste in the waste incineration plant (MWIP) generates electricity and district heating, the raw material is irretrievably lost. In addition, the production and incineration of plastic produces CO2 is released, which contributes to global warming. So there are good reasons not to incinerate plastic waste, but to make new plastic out of it. Nevertheless, many municipalities in Zurich do not yet have separate collections for plastic. This is because plastic recycling is not ecologically sensible in every case, as the Canton of Zurich's Department of Construction writes. Only if certain conditions are met is it better to collect plastic waste separately instead of using it to generate electricity and heat in a waste incineration plant.
Plastic must not end up in the sea
According to the Construction Directorate, it is important for ecologically sensible plastic recycling that as high a proportion as possible of the collected plastic waste can actually be reused for the manufacture of new plastic products of the highest possible quality. Today, this proportion is 50 percent at best. This is because the separation of plastic waste, which is made up of a wide variety of plastic types, into sorted, high-quality starting material for new plastic is technically very demanding. Under no circumstances should the non-recyclable residual waste be improperly deposited or incinerated in distant countries, or even be released into the environment - otherwise separate plastic collections would be counterproductive. It is therefore crucial that the plastic that is not returned to the material cycle is correctly recycled in a Swiss disposal facility.
Introducing meaningful collections has been difficult
Cities and municipalities are responsible for the disposal of household waste. They can grant permission to private companies to set up plastic collections in their municipality. Many municipalities would also like to do this. But until now, it has been very difficult for them to assess and verify whether the disposal company is actually recycling the waste in an ecologically sound manner, according to the construction directorate. Now, an agreement between the Construction Department and the Swiss Plastic Recyclers Association (VSPR) provides a remedy. Disposal companies that want to establish a separate collection for plastic waste in Zurich municipalities can join the agreement, according to the media release. In doing so, the disposal companies would commit themselves to complying with high environmental standards. If cities and municipalities in the future grant a separate collection permit to a company that has signed the agreement, they can be sure they are really doing something good for the environment, the media release emphasizes. According to the canton, this should give a strong boost to ecologically sound separate collections of plastics in the canton of Zurich. This is precisely the idea behind the agreement between the canton and the waste disposal industry.
Agreement between canton and plastic recyclers
The main points that waste management companies signing the agreement undertake to comply with:
- The percentage of collected plastic that goes back into the cycle as secondary raw material (plastic granulate) should be at least 50% and should increase continuously:
- to 55% by 2025
- until 2028 on 60%
- by 2030 to 65% and more
- From 2030: annual increase until 70% is reached.
- The quality of secondary raw material should correspond to that of primary raw material.
- The residual quantities that cannot be recycled must be properly incinerated in a Swiss disposal facility - such as a MSWI plant or a cement plant.
In order to enable complete control over the disposal routes of plastic waste, the Swiss Plastic Recycler Association has set up a licensing system for the disposal companies. The fulfillment of the above-mentioned criteria must be proven by the licensed disposal companies within the framework of monitoring and verified by independent auditing.
Source: Department of Construction, Canton of Zurich
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