Dupnitsa, Bulgaria

GENERAL DATA

NATIONAL AND REGIONAL SYSTEM

Legislation & targets

There are no specific recycling targets additional to those set by the EU legislation.

EPR system

The two systems for mixed waste and separate collection apply to all citizens, shops and businesses in the municipality of Dupnitsa.
Residual waste is collected in bring bank large metal bins (on wheels). Currently, there is no separate collection of bio-waste but it is foreseen to introduce it by 2020 .

Dupnitsa municipality has a system for separate collection of packaging waste since 2006³. Also graphic paper is accepted within the system. The mayor of the municipality determines the locations to deploy the necessary elements of the system for separate collection and sorting of packaging waste. Currently Dupnitsa Municipality has 85 sets of containers for selective collection (blue, yellow and green) in the city of Dupnitsa and 42 sets of containers distributed throughout the six villages that are included in the separate collection system. Separate collection system includes solely settlements with over 400 inhabitants.

The frequency of service vessels for separate collection of recyclable waste is as follows:
– Blue container (paper and cardboard) – 3 times a month;
– Yellow containers (plastic and metal) – 2 times a month;
– Green containers (glass) – once every three months.

According to the legislation, settlements with more than 10,000 inhabitants (such as the City of Dupnitsa) should have in place site(s) for handing over separately collected household waste, including bulky and hazardous waste. However, there are no such recycling yards in place yet.
In addition to the bring bank system, citizens can also bring recyclable waste (paper, cardboard, PET and plastic films) to special “shops for secondary raw materials” for which they can get a small financial compensation. There are four such shops in the Municipality.

Municipality Dupnitsa has no data about the total quantity of paper generated by the population at its entire territory since the separate collection system covers only 7 of a total of 17 populated areas within the municipality. Significant amount of the paper is being burnt by the population (ex. for heating purposes) and important quantities further get in the general flow of residual waste that is not being separated and ends up at the municipal landfill for solid municipal waste in the town of Dupnitsa. Sorting at the landfill site is done by informal groups of collectors and is not officially counted. The landfill site does not correspond to the European and national standards.

There are proposals for the building of new regional center for treatment of municipal waste. It would include a landfill site (according to the standards), separation installation with manual sorting for residual and separately collected waste; installation for open composting of separately collected bio-waste and a civic amenity site. However, currently there is no agreement on the exact location of the site and the investment plan is stopped.

The recycling rate above is calculated on the basis of quantities collected in bring bank containers. However, as mentioned, these are under-representative of the total amount of generated waste.

The fees for household waste are determined by the Municipal Council based on a property tax assessment or based on the waste amounts of the previous year. An individual typically pays an annual waste fee of €7 and a 4-person household a fee of €29.

Businesses and shops in the municipality of Dupnitsa need to use the system of separate collection.

According to the Waste Management Plan for the period 2015-2020, the amounts collected from waste taxes cover the expenses related to waste management activities.

– Vandalism is a problem not only in the municipality of Dupnitsa, but as a whole in Bulgaria. Frequent act of vandalism is burning of containers (the majority are plastic containers) and its contents (paper and cardboard are burnt)
– Contamination: because citizens do not pay attention to the colour of the containers they use or because the material from the different containers gets mixed because of scavengers
– Littering around collection points: insufficient compression and faster filling of the containers; citizens not paying attention to where they throw their waste; littering after scavenging
– Insufficiently good compression of paper and cardboard waste before throwing it in the separate collection containers that results in faster occupation of complete volume and their shortage.
– Large-size cardboard waste (cardboard boxes, paper cassettes) from households and sales points is being placed around, inside and near the containers for mixed municipality waste, since the separate collection containers are of small volume and opening.
– Paper and cardboard being taken away from the separate collection containers by scavengers who deliver it to secondary raw materials’ points.
– Citizens indicate that containers for separate collection of paper and cardboard are placed at an inconvenient distance (too far from their homes) and have inadequate openings (too small)
Furthermore, a serious problem is the insufficient paper collectability from the households:
– Most of the population of Municipality Dupnitsa uses solid fuel for heating (wood and coal) and thus also uses the paper and cardboard raw material for lighting their fire-places.
– Big quantities of paper and cardboard are still found in residual waste. The waste composition analysis made in 2015 shows that 71% of residual waste consists of food, paper and cardboard, plastics, garden and inert waste (construction and demolition). The percentage of recyclable waste (paper and cardboard, glass, metals, plastics) is 41,46%.
– The achieved rates for preparing for reuse and recycling of paper and cardboard, metals, plastics and glass from households are not high enough and put at risk the achievement of the targets for 2016, 2018 and 2020⁸.