Like many organisations, TU Delft is trying to tackle waste by developing technologies that can sort and recycle materials. But to reduce, reuse and recycle we first have to understand what happens to our rubbish.
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Working with the Logistics & Refuse Disposal department, last year a project group of TU Delft MSc Industrial Ecology students mapped the waste streams generated on campus as part of a sustainability evaluation.
Once we throw something away, it is conveniently and regularly removed. Thus we generally have little grasp of the quantity of waste we generate. In the Netherlands people typically throw away 1kg per day of all kinds of sub-stances, resulting in around 400kg per person per year. This is just household waste, which is around 10% of the total waste generated by all human activity, such as all industrial and energy production. In 2012, the Netherlands generated 8 million tonnes of domestic waste and 52 million tonnes of industrial waste. TU Delft’s share is over 1,500 tonnes per year.
The Dutch government introduced a landfill ban in 1995 for 35 waste categories including all combustible and biodegradable waste to reduce the reliance on landfill disposal in a country with limited space. A landfill tax makes burying waste more expensive while at the same time encouraging recycling, composting and incineration as more attractive waste management options. Ultimately the government aims to transition to a circular economy and achieve full recycling of all waste.
The streams are classed into sorted and unsorted waste. Sorted waste is recycled and since landfills are largely banned, unsorted waste is incinerated to generate electricity. Dutch incineration plants also recover the heat generated from waste incineration as much as is technically and economically feasible.
Some campus waste streams are generated at a regular rate and some depend on specific one off projects. Construction and demolition waste is not counted due to this. Plant waste from the campus grounds is all composted and is also not counted.
Siebe Trompert of the project group said, “The e-waste stream is small because discarded computers get a second life in Africa through a reuse programme. We didn’t count the 1000 odd computers shipped to Africa each year as waste, but what happens when they are discarded there is conveniently not considered. Unfortunately, this could be problem shifting.”
While in the city people are encouraged to sort plastic for recycling using the plastic hero containers, on campus plastic ends up in the unsorted stream. Since it is light and bulky it is not economical to sort.
Trompert added that the study showed potential for improvement in reducing the amounts of waste generated. Some streams are generated by people, others by processes. Where individuals can make the greatest difference is throwing away less paper and cardboard.
In 2012, industrial design students of the Trashure Hunters project took two random samples from general bins of unsorted rubbish on campus, finding that around half is paper and between 10-20% is plastic and biodegradable waste, which could be recycled. “More attention should go to reducing the size of the unsorted stream by evaluating options for sorting waste on campus with dedicated bins” Trompert said.
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