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Environmental evaluation of municipal waste prevention
Abstract
Waste prevention has been addressed in the literature in terms of the social and behavioural aspects, but very little quantitative assessment exists of the environmental benefits. Our study evaluates the environmental consequences of waste prevention on waste management systems and on the wider society, using life-cycle thinking. The partial prevention of unsolicited mail, beverage packaging and food waste is tested for a "High-tech" waste management system relying on high energy and material recovery and for a "Low-tech" waste management system with less recycling and relying on landfilling. Prevention of 13% of the waste mass entering the waste management system generates a reduction of loads and savings in the waste management system for the different impacts categories; 45% net reduction for nutrient enrichment and 12% reduction for global warming potential. When expanding our system and including avoided production incurred by the prevention measures, large savings are observed (15-fold improvement for nutrient enrichment and 2-fold for global warming potential). Prevention of food waste has the highest environmental impact saving. Prevention generates relatively higher overall relative benefit for "Low-tech" systems depending on landfilling. The paper provides clear evidence of the environmental benefits of waste prevention and has specific relevance in climate change mitigation.
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“It is unclear which combination of mechanisms to prevent food waste is most effective 632 because evaluations of food waste prevention policies are scarce.”
From Drivers of food waste and their implications for sustainable policy development (2016) · cites this paper as Gentil et al. 2011
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Recent developments in life cycle assessment
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Self-citationEnvironmental assessment of solid waste systems and technologies: EASEWASTE
Kirkeby, J., Birgisdóttir, H., Hansen, T. L., Christensen, T. H., Bhander, G. S., & Hauschild, M. Z. (2006) · Waste Management & Research The Journal for a Sustainable Circular Economy · doi:10.1177/0734242x06062580 · Cited by 198
Self-citationPotentials for the prevention of municipal solid waste
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Self-citationExperience with the use of LCA-modelling (EASEWASTE) in waste management
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Research works printed but not linked: 3
- OECD, 2002. OECD workshop on waste prevention: toward performance indicators (No. ENV/EPOC/WGWPR/SE(2002)1/FINAL). Paris, France.
- Salhofer, S., Fröhlich, M., Schneider, F., 2007. How can we assess the effects from municipal waste prevention activities?, in: Proceedings Sardinia 2007, Eleventh International Waste Management and Landfill Symposium. Presented at the Sardinia 2007, Cagliari, Italy.
- The European Parliament and the Council of the European Union, 2008, Directive 2008/98/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 November 2008 on waste and repealing certain Directives, Official Journal, 312, 3
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Metadata
- Authors
- Gentil, E. C., Gallo, D., & Christensen, T. H.
- Affiliations
- Technical University of Denmark (DK)
- Corresponding author
- Christensen, Thomas H.
- Venue
- Waste Management
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2011-12
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 2371-2379
- ISSN
- 0956-053X (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W2100682727
- Cited by
- 172
- References
- 24
- Citations by year
- 2025: 4 · 2024: 7 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 18 · 2021: 14 · 2020: 11 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 16 · 2017: 13 · 2016: 20 · 2015: 20 · 2014: 17 · 2013: 9 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 19.98
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Waste Management (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Technical University of Denmark, DTU Orbit (Technical University of Denmark, DTU) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Waste Management and Disposal › Municipal Solid Waste Management
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Environmental Engineering › Environmental Impact and Sustainability
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Waste Management and Disposal › Waste Management and Recycling
- Keywords
- waste prevention, municipal solid waste, environmental impact assessment, life cycle assessment, unsolicited mail, beverage packaging, food waste, waste management systems, landfilling, recycling, nutrient enrichment, global warming potential, climate change mitigation
- MeSH terms
- Environment, Garbage, Models, Theoretical, Waste Products, Waste Management, Product Packaging, Climate Change, Recycling
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