Compromise sought in landfill wrangle

Date: 23/01/1997

By Michael Mann

A PLAN to tighten waste disposal rules has become the latest victim of a series of disagreements between Environment Commissioner Ritt Bjerregaard and Trade Commissioner Sir Leon Brittan.

Brittan is continuing to block redrafted proposals which would set much tougher standards for those wishing to bury waste in 'landfill' sites.

Industry analysts believe his opposition is a direct response to British concerns about the potential costs and political difficulties of making the changes a charge denied by the Commissioner's aides, who argue there is little hard data to back up the new approach.

“We want to see the proposals costed, as there seems to be no environmental justification for what is being suggested. You have to balance the costs and benefits of this sort of measure,” said one.

As efforts continue to find a compromise, Bjerregaard has run into a storm of protest from EU governments for attempting to push the measure through without an open debate in the European Commission.

“This is a major proposal with huge implications. It should have been discussed openly, but DGXI [environment] tried to push it through by written procedure. This is a quite extraordinary breach of internal procedures,” said one member state official.

The new plan was drawn up in response to the European Parliament's decision last May to reject a common position agreed by EU governments. MEPs were concerned that large areas of the Union would be exempt from tighter environmental standards because regions of low population density were not felt to be at risk from landfill.

They also rejected the plan to allow 'co-disposal' hazardous waste being dumped together with non-hazardous refuse to continue.

The new proposal goes a long way towards meeting the Parliament's demands, but is unlikely to satisfy several member states currently largely reliant on landfill. Opponents have been particularly incensed by plans to limit the quantity of organic materials which can be buried in landfill sites.

One of the goals of the new directive is to reduce the amount of methane emitted by such areas. According to Commission calculations, methane is second to carbon dioxide in contributing to global warming, and waste creates 32&percent; of the methane produced in the Union, most of which seeps from landfill sites.

Bjerregaard originally suggested limiting the so-called TOC (total organic content) to 10&percent; of all waste buried. The search for a compromise has already seen this rise to 20&percent;, but even that has not been enough to bring the two sides together.

Some are even suggesting that those opposed to the plan are trying to use the delay to water down the planned ten-year phase-out of co-disposal, but this too has been strenuously denied by Brittan's aides.

Countries which rely on landfilling for a large proportion of their waste disposal requirements believe the Commission's attempts to crack down on the practice fail to take account of the natural advantages offered by the geography in certain regions of the EU. “Perhaps landfill is not safe in the Netherlands, but the strata in the southern countries and the UK mean it is perfectly acceptable,” said one official.

They are most upset by the requirement to 'treat' waste before it is deposited. “For some countries, it is politically impossible to build the incinerators needed to carry out this treatment,” said another official.