Waste management - We have all made a skip of the nation

WITH the amount of waste each person generates annually set to double by 2020, it would be hard to exaggerate the sheer scale of the mountain of rubbish rapidly growing in Ireland.

According to internal documents seen by the Irish Examiner, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) predicts that nearly a third of the country’s 35 licensed landfills will be full within two years. Moreover, 11 dumps around the country could be closed by 2011 with four more likely to be shut down by 2014.

There are two sides to this problem — the disposal of waste by local authorities and the gratuitous plundering of the countrywide by feckless individuals who think nothing of throwing their rubbish over a convenient fence or into once pristine rivers which are becoming more fouled by the day.

Within a couple of years, the Government will have to start complying with the EU Landfill Directive, which obliges member states to halve the amount of biodegradable municipal waste currently disposed of in landfills.

Considering Ireland has already been granted four years’ derogation, and given this Government’s tardy response to such directives anyway, the looming scenario is that the taxpayer could end up facing heavy fines. If anything, instead of reducing the Republic’s reliance on this form of waste disposal, our use of landfill has increased. The latest figures show that with three million tonnes of waste being buried in the ground every year, the country is facing a real crisis because the remaining landfill capacity nationwide amounts to just over 25 million tonnes.

Recognising the urgency of grasping this nettle, Environment Minister John Gormley warns that mechanical biological treatment of municipal waste must form an important plank of future waste management policy. If the Greens succeed in reducing the need for landfill and incineration, the political sting of the NIMBY (not in my backyard) brigade towards waste disposal would effectively be drawn.

But while an international review team is looking at alternative ways of turning rubbish into ‘cleanfill’ by removing biological waste, their report is not expected until next summer. No doubt, by the time decisions are taken and then implemented, the problem will be far worse.

Built-in obsolescence is such an integral part of modern life that Ireland’s “waste society” operates on the principle that dumping everything and anything anywhere is the way to go. So, piles of waste litter the countryside — tattered mattresses, discarded fridges, wrecked cars, and worse — all glaring reminders of society’s blatant disregard for the environment. If anything, the situation is likely to deteriorate further in the current recession. When local waste charges go up in the wake of the budget, we can be sure this appalling behaviour will spread up and down the country.

If Ireland is not to be turned into a vast rubbish tip, it is absolutely essential that anyone found dumping waste in the countryside should be reported to the authorities, brought before the courts, subjected to the stiffest penalties — and they should be named and shamed.