Circular Economy in the EU: new measures on recycling and landfills

On Wednesday 18 April the European Parliament has given the green light to the Circular Economy Package. Europe takes another  step towards a sustainable production model: less landfills and more recycling of urban waste.
 
The new Circular Economy Package in fact provides a municipal waste recycling target of at least 55% of by 2025, a percentage that will have to grow to 60% by 2030 and to 65% by 2035. The new ambitious and stringent targets will also be applied to packaging materials such as paper, cardboard, plastic, glass and metal, which will have a specific target.
 
New measures are also planned for landfilling. By 2035, at most 10% of the total waste could be sent to landfill. Landfills often produce irreparable damage to the environment, especially when it comes to organic waste. In Europe are produced 96 million tons of organic waste, but only 30% is correctly recycled, while 66 million are still sent to landfill, causing considerable environmental, economic and social costs.
 
Organic waste in landfills can become extremely dangerous, producing leachate and methane gas that could filter into the aquifer with negative effects on human health and the climate.

For this reason, it has been approved the mandatory separate collection of bio-waste by 2024.