Landfill waste

Overview

A man walks through a landfill site — © Ziga Plahutar, Getty Images

Landfilling can have dangerous effects on human health and on the environment. In 2018, 24% of all municipal waste generated in the EU was landfilled.

It can generate leachate, contaminating groundwater and producing methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Materials are also unnecessarily lost from Europe’s economy when recyclable waste is landfilled.

According to the EU’s waste hierarchy, landfilling is the least preferable option and should be limited to the necessary minimum.

The Landfill Directive was amended in 2018 to help support the EU's transition to a circular economy.

Find a summary of the legislation here.

Objectives

The Landfill Directive sets out strict operational requirements for landfill sites and aims to:-

Protect both human health and the environment
Prevent or reduce any negative impact from landfills on surface water, groundwater, soil, air and human health.

Law

As part of the EU’s move towards a circular economy, the Landfill Directive:-

Introduces restrictions on the landfilling of all waste that is suitable for recycling or energy recovery from 2030 onwards
Limits the share of municipal waste landfilled to 10% by 2035
Requires EU countries to put in place an effective quality control and traceability system for landfilled municipal waste
Requires the Commission, alongside the European Environment Agency, to draw up early warning reports three years before each deadline.

The Directive sets specific operational requirements, such as permitting, waste acceptance, technical requirements in the operational and after-care phases and reporting.

Related laws

Biodegradable waste

Biowaste is defined as biodegradable garden and park waste, food and kitchen waste from households, restaurants, caterers and retail premises, as well as comparable waste from food processing plants.

Currently, the main environmental threat from biowaste (and other biodegradable waste) is the production of methane from such waste decomposing in landfills. Consequently, the Landfill Directive obliges Member States to reduce or divert the amount of biodegradable municipal waste that they landfill.

National strategies for managing this waste should be determined transparently and based on a structured and comprehensive approach, such as Life Cycle Thinking (LCT).

Implementation

EU countries must send reports on the implementation of the Landfill Directive to the European Commission every three years. These must be based on a specific questionnaire.

In 2018, a review on the implementation of EU waste legislation (including waste sent to landfill) was published.

Statistics

Visit Eurostat for statistics on waste generation and treatment, including landfilling.

Timeline

Key dates related to the Landfill Directive

5 July 2020
Directive (EU) 2018/850 amending the Landfill Directive enters into force
16 July 1999
Landfill Directive enters into force

Contact

For questions about EU environmental policy, please contact Europe Direct.