Waste Classification
Classification of special and municipal waste
Article 183 of Legislative Decree 152/2006 as amended (Environmental Regulations) defines “waste producer“: the person whose activity produces waste and the person to whom such production is legally referable (initial producer) or anyone who carries out pre-treatment, mixing or other operations that have changed the nature or composition of said waste (new producer)“.
By law, the correct classification of special and municipal waste must be carried out by the waste producer, applying the provisions contained in Decision 2000/532/EC as amended. The producer must identify the activity and process that generated the waste, assigning it the most suitable EWC/EER code of the European Waste Catalogue/List and defining its possible hazardous characteristics. This operation, in any case, must take place before the waste is removed from the place of production.
Urban or special waste? Hazardous or non-hazardous waste?
Article 184 of Legislative Decree 152/2006, as amended, provides that waste is classified into urban and special waste according to its origin. In turn, based on their hazardous characteristics, they are classified into hazardous waste and non-hazardous waste. Between urban and special waste there was the intermediate category of special waste assimilable to urban waste which, as assimilable, expressed a potential to be assimilated. The potential still exists but the assimilation has been done “ope legis” and, as of January 1, 2021, we are only talking about municipal waste.
The correct classification of special and municipal waste is of fundamental importance as a necessary premise for its correct management. In fact, on the basis of the EWC/EER code assigned, hazardous or non-hazardous, regulatory requirements, storage methods, selection of operators of collection, transport and treatment services vary.
How to distinguish urban or special waste?
Municipal waste (Legislative Decree 152/06, art. 184, paragraph 2) is defined as the waste referred to in Article 183, paragraph 1, letter b-ter) and precisely:
- unsorted household waste and separately collected waste, including: paper and cardboard, glass, metals, plastics, organic waste, wood, textiles, packaging, waste electrical and electronic equipment, waste batteries and accumulators and bulky waste, including mattresses and furniture;
- mixed waste and separately collected waste from other sources that are similar in nature and composition to the household waste listed in Annex L-quarter produced by the activities listed in Annex L-d;
- waste from street sweeping and emptying waste bins;
- waste of any nature or origin, lying on roads and public areas or on private roads and areas subject to public use or on maritime and lagoon beaches and on the banks of waterways;
- waste from the maintenance of public green areas, such as leaves, grass shoots and tree prunings, as well as waste resulting from the cleaning of markets;
- waste from cemetery areas, exhumations and burials, as well as other waste from cemetery activities other than that referred to in points 3, 4 and 5.
With the entry into force of Legislative Decree 116/2020, which substantially amended Legislative Decree 152/2006 as amended (Consolidated Environmental Act), waste that was previously classified as special assimilated to municipal waste is now considered municipal waste to all intents and purposes, by virtue of an ope legis assimilation. This assimilation no longer has a quantitative value, but exclusively qualitative, based on the nature and composition of the waste and the activity that generated it. The new classification is based on an automatic regulatory mechanism, whereby the former assimilated and now municipal waste are: unsorted waste and waste from separate collection from other sources, which:
- are similar in nature and composition to the household waste listed in Annex L-quarter;
- are produced by the activities listed in Annex L-quinquies.
The following waste is classified as special waste (Legislative Decree 152/2006, art. 184, paragraph 3), as opposed to municipal waste:
- waste produced in the context of agricultural, agro-industrial and forestry activities, pursuant to and for the purposes of Article 2135 of the Civil Code, and fishing;
- waste produced by construction and demolition activities, as well as waste deriving from excavation activities, without prejudice to the provisions of Article 184-bis;
- waste produced in the context of industrial processing if different from that referred to in paragraph 2 (municipal waste);
- waste produced in the context of artisanal processing if different from that referred to in paragraph 2 (municipal waste);
- waste produced in the context of commercial activities if different from that referred to in paragraph 2 (municipal waste);
- waste produced as part of service activities if different from that referred to in paragraph 2 (municipal waste);
- waste deriving from waste recovery and disposal activities, sludge produced by drinking water and other water treatments and wastewater purification, as well as waste from fume abatement, septic tanks and sewerage networks;
- waste deriving from health activities if different from those in Article 183, paragraph 1, letter b-ter;
- end-of-life vehicles.
Hazardous or non-hazardous waste
The classification of special and municipal waste is based, first of all, on identifying the origin of the production process that generated the waste itself. Subsequently, the chapter of the European List of Waste (EWC/EER code) is identified, as well as the subchapter, based on the process of origin of the waste, choosing between one of chapters 01 to 12 and 17 to 20. The procedure for assigning the EER code is based on the order of precedence established by Decision 2000/532/EC as amended:
- precedence 1 – chapters 01 to 12 and 17 to 20, relating to the source generating the waste;
- precedence 2 – chapters 13 to 15, relating to the type of waste;
- precedence 3 – chapter 16, relating to waste not otherwise specified in the list.
The identification of the EER code leads to one of the following three cases:
- the waste is identified only by a non-hazardous code, i.e. a non-asterisk code from the European list set out in the Annex to Decision 2000/532/EU, not accompanied by a hazardous mirror entry. In this case, the waste is automatically classified as non-hazardous , according to the criterion of origin;
- waste is identified only by a hazardous code, i.e. an asterisk code (*) of the European list set out in the Annex to Decision 2000/532/EC, not accompanied by a corresponding non-hazardous mirror entry. In this case, the code refers to a waste to always be classified as hazardous based on its origin;
- waste is identified by mirror items, i.e. two or more related items, at least one of which is hazardous and at least one is non-hazardous. In this case, it can be classified as dangerous or non-hazardous depending on the existence or absence of one or more hazardous characteristics. A more detailed assessment is therefore necessary for the purposes of its classification.
In the event that the attribution of hazard is linked to the presence of one or more specific hazardous substances, the identification of the hazard will be linked to the search for and determination of the percentage content of that specific substance(s).
On the other hand, in the case of generic reference to the content of hazardous substances, the classification of the waste will be linked to the search for and determination of the content of all possible hazardous substances that could reasonably be present in the waste itself.
The attribution of the hazardous characteristics is, therefore, carried out through the appropriate checks to be carried out according to the criteria and on the basis of the limit values specified in Annex III to Directive 2008/98/EC, as replaced by the Annex to Regulation 2014/1357/EU and the Annex to Regulation 2017/997/EU. If one of the conditions set out in points 1 and 2 is met, the classification procedure is to be considered complete and the waste can be classified with the relevant code, without prejudice to the necessary assessments to be carried out on hazardous waste for the purposes of its subsequent management. For the latter, in fact, the person called upon to carry out the classification must, in any case, proceed with the attribution of the relevant hazard or characteristics.
Waste identified by mirror entries must be subjected to further assessments in order to identify the relevant code of the European List of Waste. Knowledge of the composition of a waste can be obtained through different methods, applying a procedural scheme based on:
- knowledge of the source process or activity;
- on the use of the information contained in the documents accompanying the product that has become waste (e.g. safety data sheets);
- on the use of databases on waste analysis;
- on the performance of chemical-physical analyses.
In general, adequate knowledge of the composition of a waste is obtained from the combination of the different information that can be obtained from the application of the methods reported in the points listed.
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