Fourty Years of Waste Management in Germany - A Success Story with a few Errors
Following the Second World War, along with rising prosperity, the amount and quality of waste also changed. Waste disposal was characterised by substantial deficits regarding the treatment capacity and the quality of the treatment plants. The few plants that were in existence did not adhere to the necessary standards regarding their technology, hygiene and environmental protection.
The waste treatment plants – as far as they were even in existence – caused substantial environmental damage as well as displeasure and opposition amongst citizens. Waste incineration plants were equipped with inadequate waste gas treatment facilities; in composting plants composts of low quality were produced – incidentally along with a substantial smell nuisance; landfill sites had hardly any base or surface liner, landfill gas and leachates were only captured and treated in exceptional cases. Towards the end of the sixties of the twentieth century, the legislative powers were moved – partly due to the obvious shortcomings in waste treatment – to put into action a number of environmental laws, e.g. the Waste Disposal Act (Abfallbeseitigungsgesetz), the PollutionAct (Immissionsschutzgesetz) and the Federal Water Act (Wasserhaushaltsgesetz). These legal standards were complemented and concretised by various regulations. Following this, more laws were passed that have to be adhered to in the planning and implementation of waste disposal, e.g. the Environmental Impact Assessment Act (Gesetz über die Umweltverträglichkeitsprüfung), the Federal Soil Protection Act (Bundesbodenschutzgesetz) and the Federal Nature Conservation Act (Bundesnaturschutzgesetz). Today Germany has an adequate treatment capacity for the recovery and disposal of waste (Table 1).
| Copyright: | © TK Verlag - Fachverlag für Kreislaufwirtschaft | |
| Quelle: | Waste Management, Volume 3 (Oktober 2012) | |
| Seiten: | 11 | |
| Preis inkl. MwSt.: | € 0,00 | |
| Autor: | Prof. Dr.-Ing. habil. Dr. h. c. Karl J. Thomé-Kozmiensky  | |
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