TVLInk Europe, 50 years of protecting Europe's environment

Turning waste into resources

For over 30 years, the EU has been pushing for change towards the better management of waste. Since then, much ground has been covered in a bid to change both mindsets and actions at national, local and individual level, and we have come a long way.

With almost half a billion people in Europe, each one generating around a kilogramme of waste a day, the EU still faces a considerable economic and environmental challenge. But, looked at from another perspective, waste also represents an opportunity. From aluminium and steel to newspapers and electronic scrap, huge stocks of raw material can be recycled and reused.

From the first major European law on rubbish passed in 1975, to the 1994 packaging directive, and the legislation adopted in 2000 on the recycling of cars (already, today, 80% of end-of-life cars have to be recycled), our news report looks at a raft of laws put in place by the EU over the last few decades to both diminish waste on the front end as well as transform it, through reuse and recycling, into tomorrow’s resources.