Retinknig Waste

Reducing is the best way to go about managing solid waste. By just doing a few things on individual level can make an impact. For instance: you can buy products with less packaging; buy products in bulk; try to stay away from disposable goods (in particular, paper plates, cups, plastic utensils); buy durable goods.

The other best option is to reuse items as many times as it is possible. For instance, bring cloth sacks to the store with you instead of taking home new plastic bags every day. You can use these sacks again and again. Moreover, you can use containers, coffee cans, shoe boxes, margarine/glass containers, toys, furniture, etc in a creative way. A quick internet search can open a world of ideas of DIY crafts.

Many of the things we use every day, like paper bags, plastic bags, soda cans, milk cartons, are made out of materials that can be recycled. Recycled items are put through a process that makes it possible to create new products out of the materials from the old ones. For this time, municipal garbage do not have recycling option. What people can do is, sort the recyclable materials and take them with local recycling facilities. Check out coop.ge’s website.

Energy recovery form waste is the conversion of non-recyclable waste materials into useable heat, electricity, or fuel through a variety of processes, including combustion, gasification, anaerobic digestion, landfill gas recovery. This process is often called waste-to-energy. Currently, there are no facilities for energy recovery in Georgia.

Introduction to Landfills

In Georgia there are 61 official landfills. In addition, there are dozens unofficial landfills near almost all towns and villages in the country. Lilo Landfill is the only disposal area located within 20 kilometers of Tbilisi that meets the landfill standards. However, there are other conditions that Lilo lacks to be considered as perfect: 1: According to International Civil Aviation Organization standards, no open landfill should be located within 9.6 km from an airport, Lilo landfill is 7 km away from Tbilisi International Airport. 2. the gas emitted from decomposing garbage at Lilo Landfill, must be collected to prevent gas build-up, which can cause combustion.

Other landfills in Georgia have to be constructed using current technology and sanitation standards in order to meet EU waste legislation .

infromation

In Georgia only 3% of waste is recycled; the remaining 97% is thrown away in landfills (in a good case) or out in nature (ravines, rivers, village areas, etc.). It’s time for rethinking how to manage the waste and find new solutions, as the societies move towards waste recycling, processing, separation and minimization.

Only in Tbilisi we throw away 1000 ton waste every day that are not recycled. Waste now contains an increasingly complex mix of materials, including plastics, precious metals and hazardous materials those result in environmental and health damage through the release of hazardous chemicals. Besides that, Georgia has significant loss of materials as we throw away the waste.

The primary purpose of this project was to reveal present waste management problems in Tbilisi and to take a closer look to good practices. On January 15, 2015, the Georgian government passed “Waste Management Code according to which, a national waste management strategy should be developed in 15 years. At present there are no facilities separating, processing and recycling waste in Georgia.