Reducing waste through effective recovery
An environmentally responsible approach to conservation of resources inevitably implies sustainable management of waste at every stage of treatment. Local authorities' environmental requirements and those of regulations are placing tighter and tighter controls on all the stakeholders in the waste sector, especially regarding recycling and recovery of packaging and of "end of life" products. SUEZ -involved in waste treatment throughout its history- has based its policy on an increasingly efficient management of quantities upstream and on increasing recovery downstream. To keep pace with more and more exacting regulatory, technical and economic demands of its clients, the Group has brought on all of its activities to a high level of technology and expertise from collection to sorting, recycling, and including incineration and landfilling for most categories of waste.
In spite of its efforts to optimize its production processes, the Group treats an increasing amount of waste every year. To foster reduction of waste at source, SUEZ is encouraging industry, local authorities and citizens to improve their waste management by preferring energy recovery to reduce volumes of residual waste as well as environmental damage and greenhouse gas emissions. Subsidiaries have introduced programs throughout the world: materials recycling; energy recovery from waste, either by its incineration or collection of biogas; biological recycling by composting; accelerated fermentation of biodegradable wastes and water treatment sludge.
