More than half of all waste generated in Catalan cities and towns is not recycled
Municipalities with door-to-door collection do better than those with street bins
Only 47% of all waste generated in Catalan municipalities was prepared for recycling in 2021, 3.1% more than in 2020.
This means that Catalonia continues to fall short of the EU Waste Framework Directive, which set the target of preparing 50% of household waste for reuse or recycling in 2020 and increasing this proportion to at least 55%, 60%, and 65% by 2025, 2030 and 2035.
Door-to-door versus street collection
There is a significant disparity between municipalities with door-to-door waste collection schemes or 'intelligent' bins that open with IDs and those without them: towns in Conca de Barberà county, in southern Catalonia, prepared 80.43% of waste for recycling, far more than most other parts of the territory, while only 38% in the Barcelona metropolitan area was.
The Barcelona area, however, was not the part of Catalonia that fared the worst: in Cerdanya county in the Pyrenees, home to many ski slopes and vacation homes, only 28% of all waste was collected for recycling.
Climate emergency
Separating waste for recycling is key to combating climate change as it generates fewer CO2 emissions than treating non-recyclable waste – and it is cheaper.
And yet, 2,149,400 tons of trash were still discarded last year, ending up in landfills or incinerators.