How is garbage disposed of?

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

For the whole last year I have been living in the most natural bear's corner - at least, this is the impression that is created after a dozen shops within walking distance, a stack of shopping centers and other "benefits of civilization", which are extremely rare, but still had to be visited. Now this is not the case - the nearest store is a couple of kilometers from the house, a bus stop, a school and a pharmacy are even further away.

It is not difficult to overcome this distance lightly, with two small children it is already more difficult, but this is not about that, but about the fact that garbage containers are also somewhere on the horizon.

The city is small, and there is no talk of any sort of waste sorting, and it will not help: there are no waste processing plants in my area. However, this is the case almost throughout the country, with very rare exceptions. In supermarkets, a huge row is occupied by plastic disposable tableware intended for picnics, on which, in most cases, it remains. And in the European Union, which is usually accepted to scold, they want to approve a directive on the fight against plastic waste. They are going to completely abandon disposable items, the manufacture of which consumes plastic. According to statistics provided by the EU, more than 70% of all waste generated is plastic. The European Union plans to ban as many as ten categories of goods (yes, this is a drop in the ocean in general abundance, but Moscow was not built right away), including sticks for balloons, cotton swabs, cocktail tubes, and so on in the same spirit. For these things, it is easy to find analogs made from natural materials, or at least those that have a more gentle impact on the environment. The same European Union sets itself a goal: by 2025 to find a way of recycling and subsequent use for 95% of all plastic produced. What about now?

Of the total amount of resources extracted by mankind, only 10% of them make products that we really need and benefit from, and another 90% is future waste. I remember a phrase from a speech by Mikhail Zadornov - "We missed not the quality, but the bright cover, the packaging!" Apparently, the statistics are right, and in some cases, a frankly lousy quality is forgiven for a beautiful box. And God would be with her, with that packaging, if there were, where to put it, but there is nowhere! MSW, they are also solid household waste, tend to accumulate. Competent disposal and recycling are still at the level of exceptions rather than rules, although it should be quite the opposite.

In many European countries, there is an interesting system: instead of outweighing the headache of waste disposal on municipal authorities, the legislation has once and for all decided that the manufacturer is responsible for recycling the packaging of his goods. A consumer can come to any supermarket and hand over absolutely any container that will be sent back for further processing back to the manufacturer, and the store is obliged to accept it and issue a certain pretty penny at the checkout. The logic is outrageously simple: if you have to spend resources on recycling the containers you have made, then you will try to use packaging materials as economically as possible. Even if the cost of processing is invested in the price of the product, this stage still cannot be avoided. And here are the consequences: in Russia, municipal enterprises are responsible for the removal and disposal of waste, not business. There is no need to talk about the cleanliness of cities in Europe and in Russia. I really want to stay in rose-colored glasses - for the time being I believe that the whole point is in the problem of garbage disposal, and not the ability to calmly wind up on the street / in nature and go on about your business.

Whatever it was, but the disposal of waste, whether it be raw materials from enterprises or residential areas, is a very painful issue for Russia. Garbage processing plants are not in every city: in some places there are, of course, but mostly these are enterprises that can offer only banal waste incineration, and not its full-fledged recycling. All manipulations with waste at such enterprises are most often carried out manually, which increases the labor intensity and duration of the process. And the West has largely abandoned this method - environmentalists have long ago proved that incineration of garbage into the environment releases no less (or even more) harmful substances than as a result of the work of any industrial enterprise. The path of simplification is not always the most correct, but for some reason, it is along this path that Russian utilities are jumping, and I mean not simple hard workers, but a higher stratum. Where is the garbage usually taken out? To the nearest landfill. Cities are overgrown with such dumps, which from time to time are covered with a thick layer of clay and earth to give them a more or less decent look. But you can't constantly build up a dump in height, right? And there are fewer and fewer free places to place the next landfill every day, especially around megalopolises. But the garbage is not getting smaller, rather, the opposite is true. Local administrators cannot or do not want to solve this problem, so it came to a question to the president during the hotline. The question was asked last year and the dump in Balashikha was closed. But, probably, it would be more correct to say that it was simply moved from Balashikha.

And here's what's interesting. If in European countries they are concerned about what to do with the accumulating waste, how to recycle it, and how not to harm the environment, then some Asian and European states do exactly the opposite: for them, garbage, even if it is their own or someone else's, is a way of earning money. In pursuit of replenishment of the treasury, they buy up waste in neighboring countries in order to dispose of it on their territory. For example, the capital of Ghana, Accra - one of the districts of the city is a natural cemetery of electronic waste. Failed electronic devices, worn out batteries, computers - almost 215 thousand tons of this stuff is imported annually to Ghana from Western Europe to rest in a "personal" dump. Add here almost 130 thousand more tons of your "good", and do not forget to take into account that local waste processing enterprises are very far from the level of modern and environmentally friendly plants. Yes, some of the waste is recycled, receiving the status of recyclable materials, but the lion's share is simply buried in the ground. And let it be buried, be it paper or food waste, but no - for the most part it is plastic of all stripes, and heavy metals. By burying this "wealth" over and over again, Ghana is gradually acquiring the status of an ecological time bomb.

Using the Chitarum River in Indonesia as an example, one can talk about a situation that has long ceased to be something terrifying for a number of countries, and, so to speak, has become a habit with them, becoming something commonplace. So, Chitarum is a full-flowing stream running past Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia, towards the Java Sea. It is very important not only for the five million people permanently living in its basin, but for the whole of West Java as a whole - the water from Chitarum is used in agriculture, the organization of industrial water supply, and much more. But, as it usually happens, on the banks of this river, several dozen textile enterprises are lined up, which "give" Chitarum waste in the form of dyes and other chemicals. If this could be done, then the trouble is not great: treatment facilities could at least slightly solve this problem. The fact is that the river is very difficult to see, and not to be confused with another landfill: its surface is completely covered with various debris, most of which is the same plastic. In 2008, the Asian Development Bank allocated half a billion dollars in loans to clean up the river: the Chitarum was called the dirtiest river in the world. The subsidy went as intended, but things are still there. While those in power were deciding what to do with the river, the people are so accustomed to throwing everything unnecessary into it that the proverb about the humpbacked and the grave comes to mind. Moreover, the fishermen who were left out of business due to the pollution of Chitarum (the fish that managed to survive and adapt to the living conditions in such a cesspool is simply dangerous to eat), have found a new way of earning: they collect plastic waste from the surface of the river and they are handed over to recycling centers, where they are paid a small penny for it. So everyone is happy - some have "laundered" the money, the second continue to earn, the third do not bother with the place where you can throw the garbage. The fish is just unhappy. But she is silent, so everything is in order.

She is also silent in the Pacific Ocean, where a real island was formed from plastic waste. I have already mentioned it on this resource, I will give a link at the end of this article. Here, too, dozens of "entrepreneurs" gather every day, collecting everything of value from the rubbish spot. It's a shame that for many of them this way of earning money is the only one.

All over the world, researchers of this problem unanimously repeat: you need to be more economical, this is the only solution to the "garbage question". Instead of throwing a tin can or shampoo bottle in a landfill, where it is rolled into the ground and left to decompose for years, you can recycle it into something useful. This option is especially respected in the West, because recycling means that you can earn / save on conventional waste again, or even more than one.

In Russia, South America, Africa and Asia, people have not yet worked out a rule for themselves - to sort garbage. Despite the fact that this is outrageously simple, we still throw everything in one container - construction waste and waste after cooking, read newspapers, glass bottles, and so on, so on, so on. We do not yet have containers in public areas with the words "For glass", "For food waste", "For plastic", and so on - what kind of "specialized" containers can we talk about, if ordinary ones cannot be found everywhere, as now in my place of residence. In Western Europe and North America, a similar method has been practiced for a long time, because they realized that it is easier and more economical to sort waste immediately in residential areas, and the resources that are freed up at enterprises freed from sorting can be used for recycling.

An interesting system exists in Germany. In addition to the usual separate collection of garbage, there is also Duales System Deutschland GmbH - in fact, a legally established requirement according to which any manufacturer is obliged not only to reduce the amount of material consumed for packaging goods, but also to develop it either rapidly decomposing in the natural environment or not delivering special hassle when processing at the appropriate facility. We wish we had such a law! But while such a level is only in Germany, even other European countries have not caught up with it - theoretically, the Germans can even dispose of garbage from other countries, not only their own.

The "garbage issue" is not badly resolved in Australia: every quarter up to 350 Australian dollars are allocated in each settlement, intended specifically for the removal of waste and their processing. Yes, landfills exist, but rather as a temporary storage facility, a sort of transshipment base: waste sorting also takes place here, but in a more global sense. Construction waste is transported to one side, waste products from livestock farms to the other. Each landfill has its own purpose, and each type of waste has its own way of processing and options for further use.

However, as the most original way of garbage disposal, I would like to highlight Semakau - one of several dozen Singapore islands. The reason for the allocation is simple: the fact is that this piece of solid earth is not at all earth, or rather, it is far from all of it. Semakau is an artificial island, construction of which began in 1999, and its completion is only planned for 2035. Since Singapore is a multitude of islands, it is simply not possible to organize a landfill in the literal sense of the word, but this garbage does not diminish. The islanders have found an interesting solution: about 38% of the generated waste can be burned, another 60% is sent for recycling, and the remaining 2% of waste that cannot be burned or somehow usefully disposed of is sent to Semakau. Now its area is 350 hectares, and it continues to grow. The construction of Semakau took 63 million cubic meters of waste: before being sent to the "construction site", they were filled in strong plastic blocks, subsequently securely tightened with an impermeable fabric membrane. The blocks are poured into a closed "bay", fenced off by a kind of dam, preventing their spread over the ocean. The resulting surface is fastened, covered with a hefty layer of fertile soil, planted with trees and turns into several hundred square meters of completely inhabited, beautiful area. The water quality in the water area around Semakau is continuously monitored: it has not suffered over the years, so the local ecological situation is quite inspiring - you can swim here, and fish caught in the vicinity of the "garbage island" can be eaten.