NL
The Netherlands: eternal landfill? Not if Attero has anything to say about it!
Together we are cleaning up our country for future generations with the Introduction of Sustainable Landfill Management project.
A wrapped "gift" for our children?
In order to prevent waste from leaking into the soil, we carefully seal our landfills. The hermetically sealed landfills must be monitored in perpetuity and its potential uses are limited.
We will pass on this case to our children and grandchildren, and they to their children and grandchildren, and so forth.
Or: a new purpose in 10 years!
Our landfill in Bergen op Zoom, Kragge II, is one of the three pilot sites for the ten-year national Introduction of Sustainable Landfill Management (iDS) pilot. If the experiment succeeds, the legally required perpetual aftercare for sealed landfills will be a thing of the past. We will no longer have to pass on this care to future generations. A former landfill will no longer require special attention and top seal will no longer be necessary. The results of the pilot project are of economic and environmental interest both within and beyond our national borders.
Every year, the Netherlands produces approximately 60 million tonnes of waste. The vast majority of this waste can be recycled or otherwise be put to good use. By doing this, less than two million tonnes of the initial sixty million tonnes of waste remains. This waste is landfilled. The waste – carefully sealed – will remain at this landfill forever. This sealed waste requires perpetual supervision and maintenance in order to prevent it from contaminating the environment.
This prompted the waste industry, provinces and the Ministry of Infrastructure and Environment to investigate whether a different and better method exists. Together they created the Introduction of Sustainable Landfill Management (iDS) programme. At the heart of this programme is the question of whether it is possible to render contamination within the landfill harmless. This is important to us and future generations, which we do not want to burden with our waste.
On 1 July 2016, the ten-year Sustainable Landfill Management experiment officially commenced. An interim evaluation was conducted in 2021. Read the report here: Interim Evaluation Sustainable Landfill Management
Visit the Dutch iDS website for more information about the project and its progress.
Animation IDS
We explain in an Dutch animation how the Sustainable Landfill Management project works in Bergen op Zoom.