Electronic waste

Tons of solid and liquid waste has spilled into the Aegean Sea and the Bafa Lake Natural Park in Turkey's western province of Ayd?n after regulator covers on the Greater Menderes River were opened. 

Romania has collected and recycled less than 20 per cent of all electrical and electronic waste in recent years and is at the bottom of a European table ranking, according to a study by the UN and Interpol.

Authorities are investigating possible links between last week?s toxic fire that destroyed a recycling plant in Aspropyrgos, west of Athens, and an illegal waste shipment from Greece that was intercepted by Bulgarian police last month.

As an investigation gets under way into the cause of a large fire that broke out at a privately owned recycling plant in Aspropyrgos, southwest of Athens, on Saturday and burned for days, sources at the fire service said they could not rule out arson.

The Plant for Mechanical Biological Treatment of Waste in Sofia will be the second largest in Europe, right after the unit in Spain's capital Madrid.

BELGRADE - Over 1,000 tons of hazardous waste will be disposed in Serbia by the end of the year, Head of Waste Management Department in the Ministry of Agriculture and Environmental Protection Radmila Serovic announced on Tuesday.

The Environmental Inspectorate, ISHM on Friday ordered Kurum's plant near the city of Elbasan in central Albania to stop work after it found in an investigation that the company generates 48,000 tons of metal slag waste every year, including zinc oxide and lead dust.

Draft legislation aimed at minimizing European Union fines for noncompliance with waste management directives, which was submitted in Parliament Monday, foresees the closure of all illegal landfills in Greece in the next six months with or without the consensus of regional and local authorities.

Greeks are getting better at sorting their trash and recycling, a recent study by environmental group WWF Greece has found, though they are still Europe's laggards.

In 2007, only 58 percent of citizens said in a similar survey that they recycle at least once a month, a figure that has gone up to 86 percent today, according to the WWF report.

BELGRADE - Serbia needs a treatment facility for hazardous and non-hazardous industrial waste, as inadequate waste management is one of the most serious environmental challenges for the country, stressed the participants of Monday's public debate on municipal and industrial waste management.