{"id":4080,"date":"2020-02-24T13:18:28","date_gmt":"2020-02-24T13:18:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sportsnewsforyou.com\/?p=4080"},"modified":"2020-02-24T13:18:28","modified_gmt":"2020-02-24T13:18:28","slug":"recycling-goals-prove-to-be-a-moving-target-for-eu-members","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/?p=4080","title":{"rendered":"Recycling goals prove to be a moving target for EU members"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"art\"><figcaption>\n<p>A power plant in Sweden, above, in which waste is burned to generate energy | Jonathan Nackstrand\/<br \/>\nAFP via Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<header>\n<h1>Recycling goals prove to be a moving target for EU members<\/h1>\n<p class=\"subhead\">Many want to water down ambitious targets set by Parliament, Commission.<\/p>\n<\/header>\n<footer class=\"meta\">\n<p>\n\t\t\tBy\t\t\t<span class=\"byline\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"vcard\">Marion Solletty<\/span>\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"timestamp\"><time datetime=\"2017-09-05T06:00:03+00:00\">9\/5\/17, 6:00 AM CET<\/time><\/p>\n<p class=\"updated\">Updated <time datetime=\"2018-01-16T12:19:28+00:00\">1\/16\/18, 12:19 PM CET<\/time><\/p>\n<\/footer>\n<p>The European Commission\u2019s plan to boost waste recycling and foster a circular economy has split the EU into hostile camps.<\/p>\n<p>On one side are the Eastern Europeans, who put a lot of garbage into landfills and some Nordic countries that tend to burn their waste \u2014 both are upset over ambitious EU recycling targets. On the other side are Western European countries which generate more trash than their Eastern counterparts, but tend to be more enthusiastic about recycling.<\/p>\n<p>The goal is to adopt new recycling targets and a methodology to count the waste countries\u00a0recycle\u00a0as part of the Commission\u2019s four legislative proposals on waste. But countries, the Council and the Parliament are still far apart.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have a long way to go, a very long way,\u201d one EU diplomat said.<\/p>\n<p>In May, the Maltese presidency secured a negotiating mandate from the Council, which allowed for negotiations to start with the Parliament. However, the Council text\u00a0significantly watered down Commission and Parliament proposals on several core issues.<\/p>\n<p>In the Council mandates, obtained by POLITICO, EU countries backed a recycling target of 60 percent for municipal waste by 2030, down from 65 percent in the Commission\u2019s proposal and 70 percent in the Parliament\u2019s position.<\/p>\n<p>The Council slashed the Commission\u2019s proposed recycling targets for materials such as plastic \u2014\u00a0from 55 percent to 30 percent by 2025 \u2014 and aluminum \u2014 from 85 percent to 50 percent by 2030.<\/p>\n<p>It also pushed for countries to be given an additional decade\u00a0to reach\u00a0a 2030 cap on landfilled waste of 10 percent proposed by the Commission, a move that infuriated NGOs, which\u00a0see cutting the amount of trash being dumped in landfills as key to fostering resource efficiency. \u201cThis lenient approach is a major step back in the ambition,\u201d said Piotr Barczak, from the European Environmental Bureau, a coalition of NGOs that keeps track of EU country positions on the file.<\/p>\n<ul class=\"story-frag-list layout-linear article-in-this-section\">\n<li><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>While the first trilogue negotiating rounds focused on technical sections\u00a0of the texts, talks\u00a0are expected to get more heated ahead of the third meeting between the three EU institutions on September 26.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe have not yet opened any of the major issues,\u201d an Estonian presidency official said, while still expressing confidence they would be able to clinch a deal.<\/p>\n<p>The challenge is that countries have very different consumption habits and approaches to waste management, and that makes it difficult for them to agree on changing the hard-fought compromise reached earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p>Central and Eastern European countries, such as the Baltics, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Romania, Malta and Cyprus, rely on landfill and have low recycling rates.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Nordic countries such as Denmark and Finland put very little waste into\u00a0landfills but burn a lot of trash, something that worries environmentalists. Usually considered environmental champions, those nations opposed higher recycling targets in the Council, according to their own declarations to the European Environmental Bureau.<\/p>\n<p>Click Here: <a href='https:\/\/www.rwcstore.com\/all-blacks.html' title='All Blacks Rugby Jersey'>All Blacks Rugby Jersey<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Nordic and Western European countries also generate more waste per capita than Central Europeans, something countries like Poland were eager to point out during negotiations.<\/p>\n<p>Poland\u00a0was one of those leading the charge against the landfill cap in the Council in June, warning it could lead to an increase in\u00a0incineration. \u201cFor many local governments [incineration] is still the easiest way to do it,\u201d said S\u0142awomir Mazurek, Poland\u2019s deputy minister in charge of waste management.<\/p>\n<p>The picture gets even more complicated for material-specific targets. The Czech Republic, for instance, opposed high recycling targets for aluminum packaging, claiming that glass packaging for beverages is more common than cans in the country, so it didn\u2019t have the critical mass to build a recycling system.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt is a very challenging and technical topic,\u201d the Estonian presidency official said.<\/p>\n<p>While Parliament pushed for much higher recycling targets, the Maltese presidency had to cut that down to garner national\u00a0support for their negotiating position.<\/p>\n<p>The Estonians started suggesting compromises from\u00a0the very first days of their\u00a0presidency, a leaked document obtained by POLITICO showed.\u00a0Although\u00a0setting a lower target managed to get enough support to form a common Council position,\u00a0Parliament is unwilling to give up on its higher ambitions.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt gives a hope that the Council will be open for raising the ambition to get closer to a circular economy,\u201d said Barczak.<\/p>\n<p>In the bid for speed, the package went straight from the technical level to trilogue, as the Maltese presidency only requested a mandate from EU country deputy ambassadors. That means sensitive political issues haven\u2019t really been sorted out.<\/p>\n<p>Some EU countries are pushing to get higher-level officials involved. \u201cNot once has the package been discussed among ministers politically here in the Council. We think this is a pity,\u201d Denmark said at the Environment Council in June.<\/p>\n<p>Denmark\u2019s position is echoed in part of the Parliament\u2019s negotiating team. \u201cAs long as the Council does not have a position [at the ministerial level], it is a waste of time,\u201d Liberal MEP and shadow rapporteur Nils Torvalds said. \u201cThe Council is very divided. They should make up their minds.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<footer class=\"content-credits\">\n<h6>Authors:<\/h6>\n<dl class=\"vcard\">\n<dt class=\"credits-author\"><span class=\"vcard\">Marion Solletty<\/span>&nbsp;<\/dt>\n<dd class=\"credits-email\"><b aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"icon icon-mail\"><\/b> msolletty@politico.eu&nbsp;<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<\/footer>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A power plant in Sweden, above, in which waste is burned to generate energy | Jonathan Nackstrand\/ AFP via Getty Images Recycling goals prove to be a moving target for EU members Many want to water down ambitious targets set by Parliament, Commission. By Marion Solletty 9\/5\/17, 6:00 AM CET Updated 1\/16\/18, 12:19 PM CET&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4080","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4080","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4080"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4080\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4080"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4080"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4080"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}