Support for enhanced landfill mining

29.6.2018

Question for written answer E-003579-18
to the Council
Rule 130
Hilde Vautmans (ALDE)

In March 2017, Parliament voted to integrate enhanced landfill mining (ELFM) into EU legislation. Article 5 of the Waste Package adopted by Parliament stated: ‘The Commission shall further examine the feasibility of proposing a regulatory framework for enhanced landfill mining so as to permit the retrieval of secondary raw materials that are present in existing landfills. By 31 December 2025 Member States shall map existing landfills and indicate their potential for enhanced landfill mining and share information’.

The justification for this ELFM amendment is that ELFM not only enables the recovery of valuable materials which can be brought back into the cycle, but also allows for cost-effective remediation of landfill sites and the recovery of land area, taking into account that a large proportion of the EU’s 500 000 historic landfills are situated in a (semi-) urban environment, predate the EU Landfill Directive and are, in many cases, not equipped with sound environmental protection technologies. However, the amendment was later blocked by the Council during the trilogue negotiations.

1. What were the reasons for the Council’s rejection of the ELFM amendment?

2. How does the Council want to deal with the 400 000 landfills, which predate the Landfill Directive and which, in most cases, are not equipped with environmental protection technologies?