Developing a Strategy for Organic Waste Management in Buenos Aires

Organic waste. Photo: melGreenFR of Pixabay

Workstream:

Ongoing

started:

2021

Under this activity, the Climate and Clean Air Coalition (CCAC) is providing technical expert assistance to the city of Buenos Aires to develop a strategy for organic waste management.

The focus of the technical assistance is to provide guidance and develop the city's organic waste management strategy that aligns with its current policies and actions to divert organic waste from landfills.

Objectives

This project seeks to strengthen the capacity of the solid waste management public entity of the municipality of Buenos Aires to mitigate methane from the waste sector. This will support future reductions in methane emissions by taking action to divert organic waste from landfills. Consequently, the city can accumulate savings and derive value from its organic waste.

The objectives of this activity are:

Supporting the city of Buenos Aires in formulating a strategy for the management of organic waste in the city
Developing an estimation of the potential short-lived climate pollutants emissions reductions of implementing the organic waste management strategy, as well as an evaluation of the costs to implement the strategy
Establishing recommendations on how to communicate the organic waste management strategy amongst relevant public and private stakeholders

What we are doing

This project aims to support:

A review of the current policies, laws, and programs related to organic waste management of the city, state, and country as well as an inventory of the current organic waste management system
The development of organic waste management strategy, which includes strategies for organic waste diversion based on sectors with a special focus on food waste as well as recommendations for separate collection and transportation of organic waste, including on different types of separate collection schemes, collection vehicles, frequencies, and integration with residual waste collection.
The formulation of recommendations on:
- Targets for the separation of organic waste in the city,
- Appropriate organic waste treatment technologies and type of facilities, including recommendations on siting and scaling up existing facilities,
- The uses of organic waste treatment products based on quality and composition,
- Policy changes at the local and national level to successfully implement the organic waste management strategy, including on composting standard national requirements.

This project will also produce an estimation of the potential SLCP emissions reductions of implementing the organic waste management strategy, an evaluation of the costs to implement the strategy, and a document with recommendations on how to communicate the organic waste management strategy with the relevant stakeholders.

Why we are doing this work

The City of Buenos Aires has long been a leader in Latin America in finding innovative ways to improve waste management. In 2005, the City Council in Buenos Aires, Argentina unanimously passed a Zero Waste law, “Integral Management of Solid Urban Waste.” The law established ambitious goals and milestones to reduce the amount of municipal solid waste sent to landfill disposal. Since 2015, the city government has implemented different projects regarding organic waste management, such as:

Zero Food Waste Programme
A food waste composting facility in the recycling center
A mechanical and biological treatment facility
Three in-situ composting centers for yard waste generated in big parks

These actions were developed without consideration for long-term public policy on handling organic waste. Moreover, a large amount of organic waste is still sent daily to landfills, generating leachate and greenhouse gases, including methane.

The government of the city of Buenos Aires has requested CCAC assistance to study and analyze the solutions to handle organic waste through the development of long-term public policies, such as an organic waste strategy.