International Review of Waste Management Policy - Department of ...

6.3.3 Waste Management – Taking Stock and Moving Forward
In April 2004, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government
published the National Overview of Waste Management Plans and Waste
Management: Taking Stock and Moving Forward. 129 The report involved an overview
of progress from 1998 to 2003 and a strategy for progress into the future. Relative to
the previous policy statements, the document appears to have a reduced emphasis
on waste prevention. The emphasis is very much on ‘management’ of waste that is
generated.
The report noted that waste growth was proving to be greater than had been
anticipated:
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“From a waste management planning perspective, the significance of the data
centres on the fact that municipal waste arisings in 2001, at about 2.7 million
tonnes, had already exceeded the medium term projections in waste
management plans. In the context of projections of possible future waste
arisings, local authorities should have regard to the possible scenarios
identified by the EPA in the National Waste Database Report 2001.”
Elsewhere, we have commented on the fact the scenarios referred to in the EPA
National Waste Database Report 2001 are hardly definitive, with one positing a slight
decline in waste over 14 years (2001-2015), and another implying a near-quadrupling
of waste over the same period (with five other scenarios in between - the projections
are shown in Figure 1-2 below). 130 The report recognises that a key aim of the Core
Waste Prevention Team within the EPA ‘will be to improve data on waste arisings so
that a sound basis for the measurement and monitoring of the Programme’s impact
can be established.’
129 DoEHLG (2004) Taking Stock and Moving Forward, April 2004.
130 See Eunomia with Tobin (2007) Waste Policy, Planning and Regulation in Ireland, Report for
Greenstar.