Environmental risk of waste and its management - Environmental Deterioration and Contamination: Problems and their Management - page 149

Figure 6.5 Food waste per origin throughout Europe (FoodWaste EU, 2010).

Slovenia. There are also legal restrictions which are an obstacle in the way of compost
application in many countries.
Food waste in itself shows interesting differences between countries in Europe. The
origin of food waste classified as manufacturing and processing, wholesale, households
and restaurants or food services is shown in Figure 6.5, based on the data of Food Waste
EU (2010).

6 WASTE EVALUATION: ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS
AND BENEFITS

The management of wastes and the selection of the feasible alternatives and finally the
most sustainable management option includes a science-based and complex evaluation
of waste, waste treatment and usage technologies, as well as of the whole life cycle of
waste reuse, recycle or utilization at any level. Figure 6.6 shows the waste management
scheme and evaluation battery.
As shown in Figure 6.6, the management of the risks and benefits of waste treat-
ment should be evaluated based on the results of a series of methodologies such as
LCA, ERA of chemical substances, and SEA. At the end, the value and hazard as well
as the risks and benefits should be compared and the decision has to be taken.
Life cycle assessment of wastes is one of the best tools supporting the right selection
of the best possible option in the waste management hierarchy. Based on calculations,
the optimal management option, in some cases, is not the highest in the waste hierarchy,
e.g. in the case of the UK's LCA case study (Applying the Waste Hierarchy, 2013) for
the following:

- Food waste: wet or dry anaerobic digestion is better than other recycling and

recovery options;

- Garden waste: dry anaerobic digestion is better than other recycling and recovery

options;

- Low-grade wood: energy recovery options appear more suitable than recycling.