MECHANICAL BIOLOGICAL TREATMENT AND SELECTIVE COLLECTION OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE: WHICH INTERACTIONS?

Bio-mechanical treatments are extensively used for municipal solid waste

management. One of the problems that can be found in this sector can be related to the change of

the MSW characteristics during the lifetime of the plant. This problem is only partially related to

the dynamics of composition of the generated MSW, as the main source of fluctuation of the

input of the plant is the effect of the implementation of the strategies of selective collection. The

present paper wants to be a contribution of the understanding of this potential problem

presenting a preliminary analysis of a case-study based on the present and expected situation in a

Romanian municipality. The choice of the case-study has been related to the fact that Romania

has just entered into the European Union and than should modify its MSW management strategy

changing from a near zero selective collection scenario to a new scenario that must comply with

the principles of recycling proposed by the European Union directives