Current status and future scenarios

The latest and most relevant data on waste management in the metropolitan area of Barcelona date from 2009:

• Waste generation: 1,606,674 t/year = 1.38 kg person per day.
• Separate collection: 542,682 t/year (33.77%).
• Remainder: 1,063,992 t/year.
• Remainder treated: 341,256 t (21% of the total and 32% on the remainder).
• Remainder to Deposit: 429,318 t (7.6% less than the previous year).
• Remainder to Energy Recovery: 293,418 t/year (46% over the previous year).
• In the course of 2009, restoring operations with compacted waste has continued with the disposal of 136,326 tons of compacted waste at the barrier Elena landfill (Cerdanyola del Vallès).

Gavà Voluminous Articles Treatment Plant

Waste generation tends to stabilize in the metropolitan area of Barcelona . The metropolitan average is 1.38 kg person/day, compared with the 1.54 kg person/day on average in Catalonia (including the metropolitan area) . The metropolitan area of Barcelona is already below the level of reduction that the PROGREMIC marks : reaching out to 1.48 kg person/day in 2012.

Year after year, the metropolitan municipalities increase selective collection and the facilities treat more waste in a better way.

The PMGRM marks prevention measures and quantifies the reduction of waste generation fraction to fraction.

It also proposes the recovery goals of the different fractions for the year 2016:

Waste treatment facilities

To achieve its objectives, the PMGRM plans actions on existing facilities as well as the construction of new facilities in accordance with the provisions of the PTSIRM Pla Territorial Sectorial d'Infraestructures de Gestió de Residus Municipals de Catalunya (Territorial Sectoral Plan of Infrastructures for Municipal Waste Management in Catalonia).

Municipal Waste Data 2009. Agència de Residus de Catalunya

The actions at existing facilities are intended to maximize and/or increase their treatment capacity and efficiency:

• Adaptation of the energy recovery plant of Sant Adrià to enhance the remainder of ecoparks.
• Different actions on Barcelona and Montcada i Reixac ecoparks to maximize the treatment capacity of FORM (Organic Fraction of Municipal Waste).
• Improvements on the composting plant of Sant Cugat del Vallès to increase its treatment capacity.
• Improvements on the FIRM (Inorganic Fraction of Municipal Waste) selection plant of Molins de Rei.

Regarding the proposal of new facilities, the PMGRM suggests:

• Having at citizens' disposal two new mobile storage depots (and promote fixed storage depots).
• Selection plants of ERE (Packings and Packing Waste).
• Voluminous articles treatments plants.
• A complementary treatment plant of remainder (untreated flows).
• Expanding and modernizing energy recovery plants and other facilities.
• Restoring quarries with compacted waste.

The coverage of current expenses is one of the main challenges of the PMGRM. The financing of operating expenses would be on:

• Public Administration's contributions.
• TMTR (Metropolitan Waste Treatment Tax)
• SIG Integrated Management Systems: Ecoembes , Ecovidrio , etc.

The PMGRM pursues, according to law, that funding for the necessary investments will be entirely on the Agència de Residus de Catalunya (Waste Agency of Catalonia).

The costs are estimated at around 240-250 million euros (depending on the years and scenarios), including 30 million euros annually for new investments in the last years of the program.

Metropolitan Municipal Waste Management Program Axes 2009 / 2016