By 2025, Estonia and other European countries must recycle 55 percent of municipal waste. Tartu's new waste management plan aims to separately collect 70 percent of the city's municipal and packaging waste. Currently, that figure stands at 61 percent in the university town.

To meet this goal, an additional 5,200 tons of specific municipal waste types must be collected separately in Tartu, said Deputy Mayor Raimond Tamm.

"Among our mixed municipal waste, 29 percent consisted of bio-waste, which is a very large amount. There was also 16 percent paper, 15 percent plastic and 6 percent glass. These types of waste are relatively easy to collect separately," Tamm noted.

For example, the plan is to transition to point-of-origin packaging waste collection. According to the waste management plan, collecting packaging at the source contributes to meeting recycling targets for municipal waste.

However, Jaak Laineste, a member of Tartu City Council's Environmental Committee, questioned whether point-of-origin collection is the best solution.

"This is a new and unfamiliar concept and we don't know exactly how it will work in practice or how people will respond to it. But what is essential is that waste separation happens as early as possible. Collecting mixed waste and later separating useful materials in a factory has been tried before and it certainly doesn't work," said Laineste.

Another goal of the new waste plan is to reduce overall waste generation.

For this reason, a new circular economy station could be established in Tartu, Tamm suggested.

"The idea of the circular economy station is that materials which can be reused should not become waste at all. For example, if there is good quality wood material, it doesn't have to be treated as wood waste. It could continue to be used as wood, whether in furniture production or other construction purposes," Tamm explained.

There are also plans to improve the handling of bio-waste. In particular, Tartu aims to introduce separate collection of garden and landscaping waste as well as kitchen waste, Tamm added.

"If we look at biogas production, garden waste has presented certain challenges for biogas plants, because garden waste can include branches, which are not ideal raw materials for biogas production. If these could be collected separately, the processing would be much more efficient," Tamm said.

In summary, Laineste agreed that the new waste management plan is heading in the right direction.

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