Romania’s garbage dumps
The dirty business of waste
German companies can halve their disposal costs if they export their waste to Poland, according to Merenda. And some Poles are happy to take it.
It s a lucrative business for both sides, even if they are breaking the law, says Grzegorz Wielgosniski, an environmental engineer at the Lodz University of Technology. Describing the dirty business of waste dumping in Poland, he explains how a Polish company might offer to take plastic from a German operator and obtain a permit that says it will recycle the waste. But apart from a plot of land and maybe an excavator for unloading waste, this company has nothing that is needed for further recycling, Wielgosniski said. Whether there is a facility for this, the responsible authority has not checked, but it has issued the permit nonetheless. In such a case, the waste is usually simply burned.