The carbon footprint of municipal waste: Key insights from the ACR+ webinar

ACR+ hosted a webinar presenting the final results of the More Circularity, Less Carbon campaign. As discussed during the webinar, results of the campaign show that even with best-case recycling on critical fractions, emissions are only cut by 10%. Bold prevention and reuse strategies are necessary to achieve meaningful carbon reductions.

Invited experts from ACR+ members Zero Waste Scotland, the Irish Southern Waste Region, as well as Rreuse, and Zero Waste Europe echoed this message, urging policymakers to shift focus upstream. Presenting Zero Waste Scotland’s tool the Carbon Metric International, Donald Chapman, demonstrated how embodied emissions from production far outweigh those from waste treatment, emphasizing the need for lifecycle-based assessments. Philippa King, representing Ireland’s national waste planning team, shared how insights from the campaign influenced Ireland’s latest waste plan, which now integrates circularity and climate targets.

Panelists then called on the EU to introduce legally binding reuse and prevention targets, stressing that current policies overly emphasize recycling. They also mentioned that targets were not necessarily sufficient, and should be combined with enabling frameworks, consistent economic measures not only to create adequate market conditions to prioritize sustainable options but also to guarantee full cost-coverage and ensure sufficient funding (through EPR schemes in particular).

The full webinar recording and presentations are now available on the ACR+ website.