Problems with landfills [experts panel]

Poland is obliged to comply with the EU environmental directive. The point is to liquidate the landfills that do not meet the EU requirements. According to estimates there are about 30 of them in Poland at the moment. “Theoretically all of them should be closed” – says Piotr Manczarski from the Warsaw University of Technology. “The external fund supporting their liquidation does not work anymore. And we have a problem. Because professional shutdown – and only such would help avoid an environmental disaster – is just too expensive”.

Experts about landfills that do not meet EU requirements

Landfills

The issue of landfills which are still open was discussed with invited experts at NIK headquarters. The specialists underscore that money is the key issue now. Until 2010, we struggled with the absence of legal provisions enabling compulsory shutdown of landfills. Now relevant provisions are in place but it does not mean that they are easy to pursue” – explains prof. Marek Górski from Szczecin University and he quotes a fragment of the Waste Management Act, imposing an obligation on municipalities to set up limited liability companies to manage landfills. This model proves to be good when a company operates an active landfill, that is the one that brings profits. However, establishing a company for closing landfills means that they will not pay for their liquidation and rehabilitation. Closed landfills are no longer profitable. Otherwise, without setting up that company the municipality will not make essential profits, either. Prof. Górski estimates that tens of municipalities nationwide may be in such a deadlock.

“In a municipality like ours it’s all about money” – says one of the municipality heads present at the experts panel at NIK. “We will not complete the task without help. When the landfill site was created no one envisaged that it would have to be closed so soon because of changes in the law. And it was necessary to make sure the litter was not scattered in forests or left in ditches.

“We have too many landfills today” – claims Manczarski, PhD. “They used to spring up like mushrooms because each municipality wanted to have them. The problem is that at that time not many people considered they would have to be closed one day. And it is a costly process.”

Experts agree that this is a good moment for a NIK audit. And this one has just started. NIK will inform the Sejm and the public of the audit results in spring next year.