What do we know about the waste we collect separately?
Not much, actually. And that’s unfortunate because measuring quality allows us to know:
- Which municipality has the purest waste and therefore the most effective policy
- The purest waste can receive the best price
In practice, separated waste is often approved or rejected by entire truckloads, resulting in a lot of “good” waste being sent to incineration. Additionally, records mainly track the weight that was or wasn’t clean enough, but not the nature of the contamination.
How do we know this?
In this project, we investigated how municipalities can gain insights into the quality of separated waste streams, such as PMD (Plastic, Metal, and Drink cartons), GFT (Organic Waste), OPK (Paper and Cardboard), and textiles. For each of these streams, we created a model like the one below:
Through interviews and workshops with municipalities, waste companies, and producer organizations, we mapped out current methods for quality measurement and evaluated opportunities for improvement. We analyzed various measurement methods and identified the potential of quality measurements that can help municipalities better control quality.
Our findings show that the quality of separated waste streams varies significantly and that current measurement methods are mainly based on visual inspections, which only provide superficial insights. Sorting analyses offer deeper insights but are costly and not always representative. We explored several improvement options, including the use of new technologies such as sensors and advanced data analysis techniques, which could potentially provide more feasible and useful quality measurements. Our recommendations focus on improving measurement methods and systematically recording data to better support municipalities in their ability to manage quality.