The project:

SEI Toscana is the manager of the integrated urban waste service in the provinces of the ATO Toscana Sud (Arezzo, Grosseto and Siena), the first Vast Area to conclude the path traced by the Regional Law No. 61/2007 which merged the basins into 3 macro-ATO and provided for the identification of a single manager through a tender.

Owner of the service since January 2014 with a long-term concession (20 years) SEI Toscana has set itself the goal of defining a company development path based on the pursuit of 4 strategic objectives, including the development of "innovative services, starting the recycling and reuse of materials”, an activity entrusted to Ambiente Italia.

Numbers:

3 Scenarios

Analyzed

12 Actions

with high feasibility elaborated

2015

period of development

The context:

The strategic objectives of the business plan were as follows

  • Pursuit of a circular economy, targeting the dynamics taking place in Europe

 

  • Development of new relationships and synergies on the territory between waste management activities and local authorities, the social fabric and the world of research and schools

 

  • Maximization of environmental benefits and improvement of the environmental footprint of the waste system,

 

The lines of action to achieve these objectives envisaged the implementation of best practices and innovative solutions aimed at preventing and reducing waste production, optimizing collection models and maximizing the valorisation of materials; the comparative assessment of the footprint and the environmental benefits of the development scenarios, by conducting sustainability analyzes of the various hypothesized scenarios, through the application of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) tools

Performed activities:

For the execution of the Ambiente Italia service, it carried out the following activities:

 

  • Identification of innovative technologies or management solutions for the management of urban waste under experimentation or demonstration application in the European context, through the analysis of databases of European funding programs (FP7, Econinnovation, Horizon, LIFE, EIE)

 

  • Analysis of municipal waste streams managed in ATO Toscana Sud in the current scenario (2014) and in two evolutionary scenario hypotheses to 2021:

Hypothesis I: plan scenario focused on increasing the percentage of RD in anticipation of the final goal of 65/70%

Hypothesis II: scenario of further optimization from a circular economy perspective, focused in particular on prevention, reuse and interception/enhancement of particular flows (sanitary products, absorbents, textiles, bulky waste, vegetable oils, WEEE)

 

  • Assessment of environmental benefits in the three scenarios analysed, by calculating CO2 emissions along the entire waste management cycle (Carbon footprint). The calculation was carried out according to the ISO/TS 14067:2013 technical specification which defines the principles, requirements and guidelines for calculating the climate footprint of products, based on the standards relating to life cycle assessment (UNI EN ISO 14040 and 14044) for the quantification on labels and environmental declarations (UNI EN ISO 14020, 14024 and 14025) as regards communication

 

  • Identification of optimization areas of the MSW management strategy in ATO Toscana Sud with a view to circular economy, considering in priority order actions of prevention, reuse and reuse, separate collection, recovery of materials, recovery of energy and optimization of final treatments.

 

  • Preliminary feasibility assessment of all the actions identified in the optimized 2021 scenario and detailed analysis and technical and economic sizing of the actions considered highly feasible (12 actions)

 

  • Development of the "LIFE CYCLE TUSCANY" project prepared for the request for co-financing from the LIFE Program of the European Commission, aimed at developing a pilot experience in Southern Tuscany aimed at stimulating, starting from integrated waste management activities and through a broad involvement of stakeholders, the creation of a model of a more circular economy on a flow of resources (wood), to be used as a reference model to be replicated on other material flows and at a regional, national and European level

 

 

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