Latest ESWET News
23.08.2019
How Waste-to-Energy contributes to sustainable waste management!
Future generations deserve to live and strive in a clean and safe environment. To ensure this, the implementation of a sustainable waste management framework is essential. Thanks to new technologies and with the firm commitment of all stakeholders involved, we will be able to develop the circular economy.
Written by Edmund Fleck, ESWET President
In the last months of 2018, hundreds of thousands of young students took to the streets in all capitals of Europe with a clear message for politicians and policy makers: We have to take care of our planet, and there is not a single second to lose. They are right, and their demands need to be listened to carefully.
Waste management stands at the crossroads of worldwide challenges: climate change, pollution, health, scarcity of resources, economic development and more. The continuous implementation and upgrading of sound and sustainable waste management systems are key to uphold the right to a healthy environment, which should be considered a “basic human right”.
This is particular important if we look at the larger picture. Recent reports show that the global warming of 1.5°C or higher above pre-industrial levels would create long-lasting or even irreversible changes with serious impacts for the Earth and its population.
Europe’s waste management policies need to involve all stakeholders in the value chain for a circular economy process. Starting from the design phase of products to a sustainable waste and resource management. In order to reach the best results, it is important to equally focus on prevention, recycling, reuse and recovery.
Over the years, Waste-to-Energy plants have managed to adapt to changing waste streams, e.g. as a result of improved separate collection. They are a key contributor in fostering circular economy and achieving a significant reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and are therefore a major component of Europe’s most successful waste management systems. In this regard, European companies confirm their role of global leaders by exporting innovation and technological know-how worldwide.
Read the full article.
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01.08.2019
ESWET Interview: Docks Bruxsel – A shopping mall powered by Waste-to-Energy in Brussels
Docks Bruxsel is one of the biggest shopping malls of the capital of Belgium, with one peculiarity: it uses energy recovered by the neighboring Waste-to-Energy plant, with several advantages in terms of price and environmental impact. For instance, no production of Co2 emissions.
Interview with: Christian Germis, Retail Property Technical Director of JLL at DOCKS BRUXSEL
Let’s start from the basics. What is Docks Bruxsel?
Docks Bruxsel is a new generation shopping mall which includes more than 100 shops as well as 15 restaurants, an event hall, an indoor adventure park and a cinema. The aim is to provide to our clients an experience that goes beyond a simple shopping session and which is able to involve all the members of the family. The mall is located along the canal of Brussels, at the Van Praet Bridge where over 60.000 cars cross each day. It is very close to the Waste-to-Energy plant that treat all the residual waste of Brussels.
Is this the reason why you established a furniture contact with the Waste-to-Energy plant?
Exactly, Bruxelles Energie (the operator of the plant) contacted the promoter with the promise to deliver clean and cheap energy, therefore avoiding a whole number of investments (no on-site boilers or cooling units, no gas distribution, simpler overall maintenance). The 10-year contract signed with Bruxelles Energie has a guaranteed consumption of 6.000MWh/year, which is largely sufficient to guarantee our demand during the whole year.
Read the full interview here: http://bit.ly/2ytM6On
18.07.2019
The ‘Unsaid’ of the Waste Incineration BREF BAT Conclusions
Hubert de Chefdebien, Chairman of the ESWET Technical Committee and Deputy-President of CEWEP, published on Waste Management World his views on the "Unsaid" of the upcoming WI BREF.
Read the article on Waste Management World.
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11.06.2019
STC Power has become a new member of ESWET!
The European Suppliers of Waste-to-Energy Technology are glad to welcome the Italian company STC Power as a new member of the association.
STC Power is an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) company delivering traditional, renewables and Waste-to-Energy power plants. Founded in 1981, STC POWER has grown as EPC Contractor gaining a considerable position in the power production sector. Today it has circa 100 employees and a reference list of more than 150 clients.
In its 38 years of history, STC Power has designed, built and commissioned more than 170 plants with an overall installed capacity of approx. 1,800 MW. STC Power relies on a stable family-based shareholding and with Sterling & Wilson, as majority partner, are both committed to the company development all around the world.
To know more about STC Power, check their website (http://www.stcpower.com/eng/) and their LinkedIn account.
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05.06.2019
How to ensure a clean circular economy – An interesting discussion on waste management, recycling and energy recovery.
On 20 May 2019 a partner event of the EU Green Week - co-organised by the EU associations of Waste-to-Energy CEWEP and ESWET - took place in Brussels with the title “How to ensure a clean circular economy”. The key topic was to discuss the role of Waste-to-Energy as a pollutant sink for waste that cannot be recycled, a role often underestimated but which is paramount to guarantee that the stream of recycling is safe and effective.
Ella Stengler, Managing Director of the Confederation of Waste-to-Energy Plants (CEWEP) opened the conference by presenting the latest waste management statistics showing that only 12% of material resources used in the EU in 2016 came from recycled products and recovered materials (Eurostat, 2019). Waste undertaking recycling operations was not always finding their way to recycled products, because of the concern that POPs and heavy metals could be in the recycled material. She stressed that pollutant sinks were needed for difficult waste streams in order to support quality recycling. Furthermore, a study from the Öko Institut shows that diversion from landfill is the main contributor to Greenhous gas mitigation in the waste management sector.
Axel Singhofen, Advisor on Health and Environment Policy for the Greens/EFA in the European Parliament introduced his presentation with a reference to the EEA Environment State & Outlook 2015 which calls for a fundamental rethinking of production and consumption. He stressed the need to achieve non-toxic material cycles and not just material cycles – resulting in a clear focus on prevention over recycling in the circular economy. Regarding existing waste, Mr Singhofen acknowledged that Waste-to-Energy takes priority over landfilling for the management of non-recyclable, residual waste (as stressed in the waste hierarchy). Such waste should however be minimized as much as possible.
Silvia Freni Sterrantino, EU Regulatory Affairs Manager at European Plastics Converters (EuPC) presented the activities of EuPC. When, referring to the Circular Plastics Alliance and the set objective to ensure that 10 million tonnes of recycled plastics find their way into new products by 2025, she highlighted that there was currently a gap between foreseen supply and demand which could hamper that objective. The reasons for this gap include market failures and limits to the recyclability of products.
Giovanni Lonati, Associate Professor of Environmental Engineering, Civil and Environmental Engineering Department of Politecnico di Milano presented a study analysing the impact of PM10 and NOx emissions from a Waste-to-Energy plant and from road traffic in the surroundings of the plant on air quality in Northern Italy. The study found that the real emissions from the Waste-to-Energy plant are well below the authorised limits and that the contribution of the Waste-to-Energy plant emissions to the ambient air concentration of PM10 and NOx is very well below the contribution of the road traffic.
Jorge Diaz del Castillo, Policy Officer at the European Commission stressed that the Commission was working on two levels: soft law - to ensure that the provisions of the waste legislation are implemented by Member States - and hard law - by initiating infringement proceedings against Member States which can lead in some cases to hefty penalties. He also explained the new ambitious recycling targets and calculation method and the landfill reduction target, setting the bar high for some Member States lagging behind. The need to address the implementation gap in the EU becomes most urgent in the light of the application of the new EU waste legislation as of 5 July 2020, he concluded.
Acknowledging the lack of political will of Member States, Emmanuel Katrakis, Secretary General of EuRIC believed that sound waste management should not only be achieved through quantitative recycling targets. He insisted on the need to create the right market conditions to have a genuine internal market for recycling that remove obstacles to circular flows and stimulate the demand of recycled materials, moving away from the chicken and the egg dilemma between the demand and the supply side. He also added that it is instrumental to improve the interface between waste and chemicals legislation and adapt it to circular flows.
Patrick Clerens, Secretary-General of the European Suppliers of Waste-to-Energy Technology (ESWET) explained that the Waste-to-Energy sector has dramatically improved in resource recovery in the last decades and that the society and the institutions should acknowledge that modern Waste-to-Energy plants are contributing to the circularity of resources, in particular through very high energy and material recovery levels. Furthermore, he stressed that today it was possible to recover all bottom ash, including the very fine fractions of metals that are in them, which delivers high value metals such as e.g. gold and copper to smelters for recycling.
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03.06.2019
19th June 2019, ESWET co-organises a session at EUSEW - EU Sustainable Energy Week
Green Hydrogen Decoupling the European Energy Network
The session aims to focus the attention on the strategic importance innovative green hydrogen production has in the Energy Transition. Organised by IMIEU - Institute for Infrastructure, Environment, & Innovation with the co-organisation of ESWET, Hydrogen Mobility Europe, Politecnico di Torino and GENCOMM.
Agenda:
09.00-09.15: Current state and future of Hydrogen in Europe
09.15-09.20: How Hydrogen fits the European decarbonisation agenda
09:20-09:50: First Panel: Technologies and producers
09:50-10:20: Second Panel: Applications and methods
10:20-10:30: Conclusion and final discussion
Session description and agenda (with speakers) on the EUSEW website: https://eusew.eu/green-hydrogen-decoupling-european-energy-network
Registration is mandatory. You can register here: http://bit.ly/2Mr4D7S (EU login account required)
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19.04.2019
20th May 2019, CEWEP – ESWET Green Week Partner Event:
How To Ensure A Clean Circular Economy?
Every natural cycle needs a way to eliminate the residues. Our bodies have liver and kidneys to keep them clean but how can you ensure that waste that is polluted, infectious or too degraded is treated safely in a circular economy?
20th May 2019, 15h30-18h00
Representation of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia to the EU,
Rue Montoyer 47, B-1000 Brussels
Programme
15h30-16h00 Registration and Coffee
Axel Singhofen, the Greens/European Free Alliance
Silvia Freni Sterrantino, European Plastic Converters
Prof. Giovanni Lonati, Politecnico di Milano
Panel discussion
Additional panellists: Jose Jorge Diaz De Castillo, European Commission (TBC), Emmanuel Katrakis, EuRIC, Patrick Clerens, ESWET (TBC).
Moderator: Ella Stengler, CEWEP
Conclusions by Jose Jorge Diaz De Castillo, European Commission (TBC)
17h30-18h00 Cocktail
End 18h00
The next few years will be crucial for the implementation of the Circular Economy Package adopted in 2018. And in this process, it should not be forgotten that some waste, due to its composition, should not be reused, recycled and made into new products. In integrated waste management systems, Waste-to-Energy is key to decontamination of recycling streams, thus protecting human health and the environment.
2019 will also be the year of even more ambitious environmental standards for Waste-to-Energy. The newly reviewed Best Available Technology for Waste Incineration will be published in summer 2019 and by implementing the new requirements, Waste-to-Energy will improve even further its performance.
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26.03.2019
Recycled, recovered with Waste-to-Energy or landfilled? How is municipal waste treated in Europe?
Eurostat has recently updated their latest statistics regarding municipal waste treatment in the European Union. Increasing shares of recycling and Waste-to-Energy and lower shares of landfilling across the board are encouraging. However, there is still room for improvement.
Eurostat has recently updated its statistics on the treatment of municipal waste, taking into account data from 2017. This graphic shows how European Union (EU) Member States and the EU as a whole send their municipal waste to the three main treatment options available: recycling, Waste-to-Energy and landfilling.
The trends are clear: municipal waste is increasingly diverted from landfilling to recycling and Waste-to-Energy. With further efforts, EU Member States will get closer to reaching their recycling target of 65 % by 2030 and to limit the share of landfilling to a maximum of 10 % of treated municipal waste.
Positive trends through these efforts are especially noticeable in countries such as Estonia, Lithuania and Finland, where increasing recycling capacity and landfill diversion called for the creation of new Waste-to-Energy capacity to absorb the residual waste from recycling operations and landfill closures. Data also confirms the tendency that countries with high recycling and Waste-to-Energy rate are also the ones with a greater awareness of environment protection.
Conversely, huge improvement is still possible and needed in Europe. Countries such as Bulgaria, Cyprus, Croatia, Czech Republic, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Malta, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Spain are still sending more than 40% of their municipal waste to landfill. In order to provide a cleaner and healthier environment for future generations, it is time to further improve the way municipal waste is treated and definitely relegate landfills to history books.
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11.03.2019
ESWET at the Energy from waste conference: presenting future solutions for bottom ashes.
(Picture by ‘Photoperspective’).
On the 28 February 2019, ESWET took part in the Energy from Waste conference in London, one of the main conferences in Europe for the sector of Waste-to-Energy. ESWET’s Secretary General delivered a presentation on the latest regulatory changes related to the recovery of bottom ashes (IBA).
Before an international audience of more than 250 decision makers and lead companies in the Waste-to-Energy sector, ESWET’s Secretary General Patrick Clerens addressed the topic of future directions and applications for bottom ashes.
In particular, he described in detail the latest regulatory changes affecting the recovery of bottom ashes and the resulting possibilities for innovation, change and value creation for this valuable stream of materials.
The slides of ESWET’s presentation are available here: http://bit.ly/2NUW2aD
More details on the conference on the official website: https://www.efwconference.com/
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01.03.2019
Taxonomy: Should facts guide the EU Commission and the European Parliament? What to do after recycling with residual waste?
All waste handling must follow the waste hierarchy: Avoid-Reuse-Recycle-Recover-Dispose. But since some waste cannot or should not be recycled, Waste-to-Energy (WtE) is responsible for closing the "toxic loophole" of pollutant recycling.
Who wants to recycle persistent organic pollutants (POPs) from some plastic waste into plastic toys? Who wants to turn arsenic that was used in wood-preservative (chromated copper arsenate) in a compost for food crops?
This is exactly what the Parliament will achieve if the role of WtE is not recognised as a necessary step to avoid spreading pollutants.
Read the full article: http://bit.ly/ESWETopinion
Author: Patrick Clerens, ESWET Secretary General
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28.11.2018
Waste-to-Energy’s contribution to the “Long-term EU greenhouse gas emissions reductions strategy”
This position paper, jointly issued by the European associations ESWET and CEWEP, outlines the GHG emissions savings potential of Waste-to-Energy and lays down policy recommendations in the areas of waste, energy, climate, infrastructure and research and innovation to achieve this potential.
For instance, it is explained how, with proper waste management in place, far more than 200 million tonnes of CO2 eq can be avoided annually.
Full document available: http://bit.ly/2DY81lq
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29.10.2018
EU Public consultation addressing the interface between chemical, product and waste legislation.
ESWET – European Suppliers of Waste to Energy Technology – calls upon the EU to amend its legislation to facilitate the uptake of secondary raw materials in safe applications.
Click here to read the full response of ESWET to the public consultation.
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10.10.2018
ESWET response to the EC Public Consultation on the Strategy for Long-Term EU Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reductions
ESWET welcomes this opportunity to participate in the elaboration process of the strategy and believes that the European Union will be a leading global force for a clean and innovative energy transition.
In particular, ESWET believes that the waste management sector should be fully involved in the transition as it could contribute to important GHG emissions savings by fully switching from a “business-as-usual” approach to waste to a stronger focus on prevention, reuse, recycling, and recovery.
You can find the full response of ESWET to the public consultation here.
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04.07.2018
Industry4Europe Joint Paper: “A Governance Structure for an ambitious EU Industrial Strategy”
ESWET co-signed together with other 121 association member of the Industry4Europe coalition the Joint Paper “A Governance Structure for an ambitious EU Industrial Strategy”. The paper proposes a governance structure which enables the implementation of an ambitious EU Industrial Strategy, based on an informed dialogue between the industry, decision-makers at EU, national, regional and local levels and the Civil Society.
Read it here!
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28.05.2018
Press Release: Single use plastics must be banned!
Single use plastics such as the ones found in cups for beverages, cutlery or straws should be banned if a robust life cycle assessment does not show that they are the best option for the environment. Such plastics are normally not compatible with the circular economy.
This is why ESWET welcomes the publication of the Commission proposal to reduce the impact of certain plastic products on the environment. In particular, once in force, the legislation will contribute to the reduction of plastics which are not suitable for reuse, recycling or recovery.
Read the full press release here.
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24.05.2018
ESWET Activity Report 2017
ESWET Activity Report for 2017 is out! Read it to discover more about our activities and positions over the past year and to understand how we value your waste.
