Release 003/2016 – The 19th of March successfully finished the workshop “Sizing and Operation of the Classification and Exploitation of Recyclable and Organic Stations (ECAs)”, organized in the city of Medellin (Colombia) by the Northwest Sectional of ACODAL and developed as part of the educational plan that this association has design for the year of 2016.
The new national regulation for the Solid Waste Management, which is expected to enter into effect from the month of April of the present year, gives special relevance to the exploitation processes of both recyclable solid waste and organic waste and recognizes that there is an economic cost derived from such processes that has to be included into the sanitation tariff framework. This new regulation, which provides guidance about how to execute activities and projects to comply with the exploitation programs included in the PGIR or Planes de Gestión Integral de Residuos municipales (Municipal Solid Waste Management Plans), incorporates the referred ECAs as essential components of its structure.
The academic program of the Workshop was structured with the objective to provide the participants with information about the techniques and methodologies for the proper sizing of this type of stations, keeping in mind physical, logistic, economic or normative characteristics, among others.
Such academic program, integrated by five theoretical modules formed by subjects such as the calculation of the exploitation potential (of recyclable and organic waste) of the municipalities, the physical sizing of the classification stations or the estimation of the new sanitation tariffs, among others, included field visits to gathering and composting centers with potential to transform into ECAs, which facilitate the appropriation of theoretical concepts through practical activities.
The NGO Zero Waste Colombia, aware that the knowledge and understanding of the subjects covered in this workshop are of great importance for the implementation of the municipal PGIRs at a national level, made part of this training by having three of its members assisting the theoretical modules, participating in the practical activities and learning key relevant information that will allow us to keep building on our objective to propose a new way to understand the concept of garbage oriented to the Zero Waste concept.
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