"Why Zero Waste is Wrong – Waste Management between Resource Efficiency and Contaminant Removal" (Prof. Dr. Daniel Vollprecht)

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At a first glance the idea of “Zero Waste” sounds appealing: Waste causes costs, environmental problems and loss of resources. However, waste generation is an integral part of every material cycle, also in nature where organic residues are decomposed into water and carbon dioxide which are then recycled into new biomass by photosynthesis. So “Zero Waste” in the narrow sense is not possible. Anyway, many people understand “Zero Waste” in a broader sense that all waste should be recycled – have you ever realized that there is no recycling without waste, since recycling means material recovery from waste? But also in this broader sense “Zero Waste” is wrong, as there is an conflict of aims between “Zero Waste” and “Zero Pollution”. Wastes – and products (i.e. “non-wastes”) – contain contaminants, partly by purpose from their production, partly acquired during the use phase.

Waste management has the “kidney function” of the society, i.e. to clean material cycles from contaminants. In fact, currently, large amounts of waste are not recycled but landfilled due to small amounts of contaminants, e.g. heavy metals in soils or industrial residues such as slags or traces of asbestos in construction & demolition waste. But where is the right balance between “Zero Waste” and “Zero Pollution”. The legislation contains limit values for total and leachable contents of contaminants which must be kept for a recycling. Are these limit values too strict? Why are they not valid for primary raw materials, but just for secondary raw materials? This talk will raise these questions from a combined mineralogical and waste management perspective and adresses an interdisciplinary audience from geography, environmental sciences & humanities, engineering, laws and economy.

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Location: WZU, Room 101 (Building U), Universit?tsstr. 1a (innocube), 86159 Augsburg

Time: 12:00 – 13:00

You can find the full program here:

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And here you will find more information on the event as a whole:

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