Before you put out the rubbish

[myabruzzohome]

Before you put any rubbish into the bin today look at this picture that shows the extent of Naples rubbish problem!

sorry cant get bmp to load but this links to the page

EU sues Italy over Naples garbage - Topic Powered by eve community

The expatsin Italy site has an interesting thread if anyones interested and heres another link to an article to read,
Who do you blame and is anyhting ever going to change?

What are Italian politians doing to stop so much rubbish being produced in the first place? Banning plastic bags? No. Encouraging composting? No making alternatives to disposable nappies easily avaiable? No.Actually a large amount of the rubbish seems not to be household waste.Surprisingly other waste has slipped in.
So are we relying on Belusconi to solve this problem????
European Commission sues to force Italy to take out the garbage - International Herald Tribune

[NickZ]

Originally Posted by myabruzzohome

What are Italian politians doing to stop so much rubbish being produced in the first place? Banning plastic bags? No.

Sounds wonderful.

Then you notice that most people use those shopping bags to put their trash in. Banning shopping bags would lead to people going out and buying black trash bags. So instead of reducing waste you actually end up with moving it around. Or worse you end up with more waste.

The problem in Naples isn't the trash produced. It's no plan to get rid of what's produced. Reducing the trash produced just slows the growth of the pile. You still need to move the pile.

Of course they could turn on the power plant they built and burn the trash. Reducing the amount of oil being imported at the same time.

[AllanMason]

Originally Posted by NickZ

Of course they could turn on the power plant they built and burn the trash. Reducing the amount of oil being imported at the same time.

Leaving aside the question of whether it would be possible to actually fire up the plants since the Camorra want waste disposal to be only in landfills controlled by them, I thought I'd heard that faulty construction of those power plants (in which the Camorra is also implicated) meant their use would spew dioxins and other poisons into the air.

Al

[Marc]

I agree.... cut watse out at the source. Bottled water would be No1 in the firing line for me.

[AllanMason]

Originally Posted by Marc

I agree.... cut watse out at the source. Bottled water would be No1 in the firing line for me.

One of the things I found interesting when I started to spend some time in The Netherlands last year is how there you get back a significant amount of money if you return many plastic and glass bottles for reuse.

Most supermarkets have machines which automatically scan bottles (either individually or, with beer bottles, by the crate) to determine if they can be recycled. Taking back a carrier bagful of bottles can easily result in getting a €5 voucher to use toward your next purchase.

Agree that acqua minerale naturale is, in most cicumstances, just a waste of resources. Unfortunately, there's currently an individual in this household who's going through a lievemente frizzante phase, so we've lately been spending time trying to stuff crushed plastic bottles into already over-full yellow plastic igloos. We have wondered what happens to the stuff... assuming it ever gets taken away.

Al

[alan h]

Recycling must be looked on as a way of significantly reducing landfill from households.

Mt commune collects on a [mainly] weekly basis Paper, Plastics, Metals, Glass and Humido ['Compostable Household Waste'] - yes that's 4 or 5 separate collections a week, plus a [small] black bag for non-recyclable waste, plus an extra Humido collection in Summer. Additionally, twice a year they collect clothing and shoes for charity

If your commune doesn't do the same - perhaps you should suggest it to them.

[NickZ]

Originally Posted by AllanMason

One of the things I found interesting when I started to spend some time in The Netherlands last year is how there you get back a significant amount of money if you return many plastic and glass bottles for reuse.

Industry doesn't like these ideas for various reasons. So they push recycling.

Marc is right to cut the stuff to begin with. Then reuse. Recycling should be the last choice. Yet it's all we hear about.

[NickZ]

Originally Posted by AllanMason

Leaving aside the question of whether it would be possible to actually fire up the plants since the Camorra want waste disposal to be only in landfills controlled by them, I thought I'd heard that faulty construction of those power plants (in which the Camorra is also implicated) meant their use would spew dioxins and other poisons into the air.

Al

From the sounds of it the illegal bakeries in Naples are already burning garbage Can the power plant being any worse?

[myabruzzohome]

We seem to spend a lot of time and money on recycling which is all wrong.

What we need to do is not to produce the things in the first place but this seems to be such a leap into the 'unknown' that politians just will not act.

There is no reason for us not to return to having a container that can be refilled once its empty rather than thrown away.it would mean a complete turnaround for us all but when we look at the situation in Southern Italy how can we afford to dismiss it totally? When I'm in Italy I can take a glass oil bottle to a local producer and then they fill it.The same for wine if you know a local who can sell some of their own produce.

[adriatica]

regarding the power plants set up to burn waste in and around Naples...it is not so much that they are faulty its the fact that the machines designed to filter waste that goes in where manipulated so that all rubbish that entered these pre burn sorting sites was let through... these are camorra controlled and meant that as they got a grant for each burnable bail produced they were making loads more money by doing things this way... and it made naples look like a very good prospect in regards recycling...

however once they started burning these bails the sensors on the chimneys started going off all the time and it was found that they were unable to actually burn any of these bails safely...

the dioxin problem in that area is one that has made the world health organisation insist that all people that live in that area have free cancer checkups yearly as the level of cancers there are something like 30-40 per cent above the national average... this problem already existed before the current 14 year old waste disposal problem...

it is not just Camorra involvement directly but political greed and abuse of funds... the area has had more funds allotted via national government and EU funding than any other are of Italy which has basically meant that it has been very profitable for all in that area to be involved.... the President of the region is now up on charges... the mayor of naples is pretty well useless... and Prodis last Justice minister Mastella was and or is heavily involved in corruption attached to funds and rubbish in Naples... maybe why hes been let to quietly slip out of the political arena as he is being investigated on these charges now...

as regards recycling here in Italy many of the northern areas are reaching very high levels of recycled waste and reducing by significant amounts rubbish that has to go to landfill and indeed many of those areas are reducing the rubbish collection tariff because of this...

as you move north south the efficacy of this reduces and you get to a line abruzzo lazio where i would say abruzzo is trying hard to manage its waste in a responsible manner but has lots to catch up on in the amounts... and it varies dramatically from province to province and even comune to comune... many of the towns now and the seaside areas have separate collection bins as described by a previous poster... there are always differential bins available as well in the streets around us...

if you look at Lazio and more specifically rome it was also labeled along with naples as a city with no real effort to cut landfill waste and also as one where illegal dumping of just plain household rubbish on the streets is now a major problem which needs sorting out urgently