Descrizione 1
Irma Lupica
In 2022, the amount of incinerated municipal waste, including RDF (Refuse-Derived Fuel), dry fraction, and bio-dried waste derived from municipal waste treatment, amounted to 5.3 million tons (-1.9% compared to 2021). Of this waste, 71.4% was processed in Northern Italy, 9.5% in Central Italy, and 19.1% in Southern Italy. The majority of incineration plants are located in the North (25 facilities), while Central and Southern Italy have 5 and 6 operational plants, respectively.
An incineration plant is defined as any fixed or mobile technical unit and equipment designed for the thermal treatment of waste, with or without energy recovery from the combustion process. This indicator measures both the number of incineration plants and the quantity of municipal waste they process.
The indicator allows comparisons across different territorial contexts (municipality/province/region) and supports decision-making processes and environmental policies. It also helps assess the impact of human activities.
The key directive on waste incineration is Directive 2010/75/EU of the European Parliament and Council, dated November 24, 2010, on industrial emissions (integrated pollution prevention and control), known as the Industrial Emission Directive (IED). This directive consolidated and revised seven previous EU directives into a single legislative framework.
At the national level, the directive was implemented through Legislative Decree No. 46 of March 4, 2014, which introduced modifications to Legislative Decree No. 152/2006 ("Environmental Code"). Specifically, Title III-bis of Part IV of Legislative Decree 152/06 concerns waste incineration and co-incineration.
Additionally, Commission Decision 2019/2010/EU established conclusions on the Best Available Techniques (BAT) for waste incineration, serving as a reference for setting permit conditions, including emission limits under normal operating conditions for installations subject to Chapter II of Directive 2010/75/EU (Integrated Environmental Authorization - AIA).
Descrizione 2
ISPRA - Rapporto rifiuti urbani - Edition 2023
Qualificazione dati
Modello Unico di dichiarazione Ambientale MUD ISPRA - Catasto rifiuti (http://www.catasto-rifiuti.isprambiente.it).
National, Regional
2002-2022
Qualificazione indicatore
The indicator measures the quantity of incinerated municipal waste in Italy. The data includes non-recyclable municipal waste, dry fraction, RDF, and bio-dried waste derived from municipal waste treatment. The information is sourced from the Environmental Declaration Form (MUD), submitted by entities identified under Article 189, Paragraph 3, of Legislative Decree No. 152/2006 to the relevant Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Handicrafts, and Agriculture.
In 2022, the incinerated municipal waste amounted to 5.3 million tons, of which slightly more than half (around 2.7 million tons) consisted of unsorted municipal waste (identified by the EER 20 chapter codes), while the remaining portion (over 2.6 million tons) was represented by waste resulting from the treatment of municipal waste (combustible waste, dry fraction, and, to a lesser extent, bio-dried waste) (Table 2). There are 36 operational plants across the national territory (Table 3).
Table 3 shows that, from 2008 to 2022, the number of plants decreased by 13 units, with a particular reduction of 8 plants in the central regions of Italy. On the other hand, during the same period, the quantity of incinerated waste has progressively increased (+21.4%). This can be justified by the fact that, where technical conditions allowed, plants have incinerated quantities of waste that enabled them to approach or reach the thermal load saturation (Table 1).
Dati
Table 1: Municipal waste incinerated by region
ISPRA
Table 2: Waste incinerated in municipal plants by type of waste (2022)
ISPRA
RU: Municipal waste;
FS: Dry fraction;
CSS: Solid recovered fuel;
RS: Special waste.
Table 3: Number of incineration plants for municipal waste, dry fraction (DF), and solid recovered fuel (SRF)
ISPRA
a Includes a plant in Colleferro that treated very small amounts of waste for a short period before being shut down.
Figure 1: Quantity of municipal waste incinerated
ISPRA
Figure 2: Municipal waste incinerated in relation to waste generation
ISPRA
In 2022, the incinerated municipal waste, including the CSS (Solid Recovered Fuel), the dry fraction, and the bio-dried waste obtained from their treatment, totaled 5.3 million tons (-1.9% compared to 2021). Of these, 71.4% of the waste was treated in the North, 9.5% in the Centre, and 19.1% in the South (Table 1 and Figure 1). Compared to the previous year, it shows that in 2022, over 102 thousand tons less were treated in total; regarding the macro-areas, decreases in the quantities of incinerated municipal waste were observed in the North (-2.1%) and in the Centre (-4.4%), while the quantities in the South remained almost unchanged.
In 2022, there were 36 operational incineration plants in Italy, with 25 located in the North, 5 in the Centre, and 6 in the South. Specifically, in Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna, there were 12 and 7 operational plants, respectively, which, in 2022, treated a total of approximately 2.8 million tons of municipal waste (73.3% of the waste incinerated in the North and 52.3% of the national total) (Tables 1 and 3).