Solid waste decreased by almost 20% in 2020

During 2020, the total amount of generated waste decreased by 19.8 per cent over 2019, the National Statistics Office said.

The total generation of solid waste in Malta during the year amounted to 2.5 million tonnes.

Hazardous waste increased by 1.3 per cent or 521 tonnes, while non-hazardous waste decreased by 20.1 per cent.

Decreases were recorded for the three major sub-divisions of non-hazardous waste: mineral waste went down by almost 533,563 tonnes, secondary waste by 46,685 tonnes and other waste by 37,232 tonnes.

Waste treatment registered a decrease of 21.4 per cent or 628,179 tonnes over the same period. This happened mainly due to a drop of 495,130 tonnes in the backfilling of mineral waste.

Mineral waste was also the major contributor for the decrease in recycling taking place in Malta which went down by 123,354 tonnes.

On the other hand, waste amounts that were sent for recycling in other countries advanced by 3.0 per cent or 2,570 tonnes.

In 2020, the total amount of landfilling taking place in Malta and in other countries decreased by 11.3 per cent while the total amount of waste that was incinerated increased by 27.3 per cent.

During 2020, the waste input into the Tal-Kus (Gozo) waste transfer station decreased by 4.8 per cent, or 843 tonnes. Decreases of 2,758 tonnes, 50,747 tonnes and 10,797 tonnes were also recorded at the Malta North Mechanical-Biological Treatment plant, the Sant’ Antnin Waste Treatment Plant and the Għallis landfi ll respectively.

Conversely, waste that was incinerated at the Marsa Thermal Treatment Facility increased by 912 tonnes.

In 2020, the separate collection of waste fractions from bring-in sites decreased by 6.8 per cent or 279 tonnes, while amounts collected from civic amenity sites increased by 5.5 per cent or 1,904 tonnes.

With regard to door-to-door collections, decreases of 5.1 and 2.8 per cent were recorded in the grey/ green bag and organic waste collections respectively. On the other hand, the amount of glass collected increased by 7.4 per cent over 2019.