Relive the conference 'The future of waste"
Litter has become a significant problem in many urban areas. Cities and communities can’t keep up with the speed at which public trash bins are filled, causing them to overflow. Waste bags in front of our houses become targets for wind, rain, and animals. And the quantity of packaging that consumers face is uncontrollable. That’s why, on November 20, 2024, City to Ocean has invited experts from Germany, Prague, Paris, Stockholm and Brussels to share their ambitious projects. Solutions to avoid litter are numerous and most presentations treated very different subjects. In preparing the conference it was much easier to find exemples of treating waste rather than avoiding waste at the source. But we are lucky to have France nearby with their new ambitious law to ban all single-use packaging by 2040. You can watch the presentations here.
Stockholm - Waste travels in underground vacuum tubes
Lars-Olov Andersson, project manager at the water and waste department of the city of Stockholm presented their vacuum waste tubes system. It is a sustainable, energy-efficient and climate-smart waste management system where waste bags travel at speeds of 70 km/h in underground vacuum tubes to reduce pollution from garbage trucks. Furthermore, in Stockholm, a study on litter gives the exact composition of the waste that is found in certain perimeters. Lastly, Lars also explained how their organic waste is transformed into biogas for their city busses.
Paris - Ambitious new law to end waste at the source
Let’s stop the problem at the source – that is the objective of the ambitious anti-waste law in France. Blanche Laskar from the waste prevention department of the city of Paris, presented the key objectives of this law and how it is implemented in the city of Paris. For example, by 2040 all single-use plastic packaging will be banned, by 2030 there will be 50% less single-use plastic bottles, no more oxodegradable plastic bags, restaurants must accept clients with reusable containers, acces to drinking water by tap assured, obligation to use reusable packaging and the law will fight planned obsolescence. This law really is an amazing example of where all countries should aim for. If not, industry will keep on flooding society with more and more throwaway packaging and items and waste management will never be able to stop the pollution and the squandering of resources.
Prague - Smart underground waste containers
Within their Smart Prague vision 2030, Prague wants to improve its waste management through intelligent underground waste containers and trucks equipped with smart sensors. Zuzana Zadražilová, Waste Management Specialist in the Environment Protection Department of Prague, and Martin Lér, consultant at OICT, presented the smart underground and above ground containers. They first explained their general waste management system. Afterwards, an overview of the intelligent containers was given with more details about the sensors and how this data collection is used to improve waste management. Today, the data is not yet used to organise dynamic collection routes but this will be the case in the future.
Germany - The German deposit system
Germany has the world’s largest and highest-performing deposit return scheme for cans, plastic bottles and glass bottles since 2003. The country achieves a record 98% return rate on eligible single-use drink containers. Robert Jansen general manager at DPG Deutsche Pfandsystem explained how this system was implemented, how it works and what are the key criteria to have a succesful deposit system.
Warning, a deposit system is a solution for single-use cans and plastic bottles and since these will not disappear from one day to the next we need a deposit system in Belgium. But the real goal should be to eliminate all single-use packaging in the futur and shift to reusables. See the example of France here above!
Brussels - New waste center with a focus on reuse
How is waste managed in our own city? Jos Reymenants, deputy general manager of Bruxelles Propreté, explained the history of the waste management system in Brussels with under more the introduction of an obligatory organic sorting bag. He also gave a detailed explanation of the new generation sorting centers which have a special section for reuse.
2 initiatives: Au Rayon Bio, and Billie Cup
Au Rayon Bio, is a perfect example of how products can be sold in bulk. Sylvie presented how the bulk system works, the benefits it can have as well as the challenges that can be encountered. This shop introduced alternative distribution machines which make it possible to sell a large selection of products in bulk, even products such as honey or jam.
Billie Cup, is an alternative to throw-away cups. Elisa explained how this reusable cup can be used over 500 times and brought back in multiple cafés and restaurants to make it easy for the costumers.
