Split loses millions for not using biowaste

The Environmental Council of the City of Split, led by the Sunce Association held the fourth meeting on composting in Split on Monday 08.12.2014.

Why composting?

For the simple reason that about 30,000 tons of bio-waste per year turns into garbage and is disposed of together with other waste at Karepovac.

Almost 2,000 tons of plant material from Split’s green areas and the Marjan Forest Park, which ends every year in an already overcrowded landfill, should be added to this. Of course, these services are paid by public companies and, at the same time, they pay for the purchase of imported humus for the needs of green areas.

Losses caused by the degradation of irreversibly mixed waste materials and the inability to further exploit them, as well as problems related to the unnecessary burden on the environment by accumulating waste and endangering natural resources are just some of the direct consequences of unobtrusive and irresponsible bio-waste management.

On the other hand, it is estimated that only composted Split green waste (2000 tons) will have achieved a value of 900,000 kunas in retail.

The Waste Disposal Act obliges the City of Split to continuously reduce the mass of biodegradable municipal waste that can be disposed of at all landfills annually by 50% by 2016.

Also, the City of Split has to provide a separate collection of bio-waste for the purposes of composting, digestion or energy recovery of bio-waste.

The waste management plan of the city of Split for the period 2008-2015 provided for the provision of a system for separate collection of bio-waste from households. However, this system has not yet been established, and as an excuse, it is stated that the Waste Management Center has not been completed.

The future of the Center is still questionable and we are waiting for the disposal of waste at Karepovac for at least next three years (which means another 100,000 tons of bio-waste, which makes almost the total annual amount of waste that ended up in Karepovac in 2013).

It would, therefore, be reasonable and wise for the responsible ones to think about the option of compost as soon as possible, especially as it will enable the citizens of Split in the future to provide for a lower cost of disposal of waste. Namely, the average price of bioprocessing is up to 40 euros per ton, while the cost of processing waste at the Center will be at least 100 Euros per tonne.

In addition, the members of the Council were also attended by the Director of Lovrinac d.o.o., Petar Bilobrk, Deputy Director of Parks and Plant Ltd., Lada Ramljak (also a member of the Council), the Director of the Forest Park Marjan, Robert Koharević (also a member of the council) and director of Čistoća d.o.o., Miroslav Delić (also member of the council).
Despite the repeated invitation to this as well as the previous meetings, the Head of the Department of Communal Economy and the Order of the City of Split, Spiro Cokarić, did not respond again.

The project partners from the Šibenik-Knin County also attended the meeting as representatives of the Ecological Association Krka Knin and the utility company from Knin.

The Sunce Association has hired an external expert for the meeting, Marijan Galović, who presented the participants with bio-composition, humification, chemical reaction and bio-waste cycle; legal obligations for composting; ways of fulfilling obligations from pre-accession agreements with the EU; models of compost (open, closed type, home composting).

There were also examples of good practice of collecting bio-waste and composting, such as Milan, which collects and compiles 86% of household biotope.

At the meeting we had the opportunity to hear what we could expect from a sanitized landfill and its impact on the environment in the future. Namely, the utopias of restoration that involved the construction of residential areas at the former landfill, have prevented us for years from taking concrete steps towards the rehabilitation of Karepovac, but also the organization of responsible bio-waste management. On the other hand, we are now in the hostage of the future Waste Management Center that prevents us from any kind of move that is at our fingertips.

Conclusions of the meeting are connected with the urgent need to establish dialogue and communication with both the City of Split and the Administrative Department for the Municipal Economy and the Order of the City of Split, as well as with the citizens, especially the local population near Karepovac.