Italian city faces rubbish crisis

[hunter]

Residents of the Italian city of Naples have been torching piles of rotting rubbish in the streets amid a worsening refuse crisis.

Most of the area's landfill sites are full, meaning that rubbish collectors have not been doing their rounds.

The streets are stinking, piled with thousands of tonnes of rotting rubbish in sweltering temperatures.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6684635.stm

I think this is illustrative of the sorts of problems that will become more common. However Naples solves this problem, it will almost certainly require a large economic investment, either in some sort of incineration scheme or in transportation to alternative landfill sites. There is no instant, inexpensive, and environmentally sound solution even as the trash is piling up and has to go somewhere.

In our modern world a fairly simple problem such as an overflowing landfill can have tremendous consequences. If we do not plan for the future these sorts problems and their consequences will become increasingly common.

So... what are we going to do as oil production declines? Are we just going to keep driving until our economic machine grinds to a complete halt?

If we no longer have the economic resources to deal with the consequences of declining oil production, then life for us is going to quickly turn ugly.

[phantom power]

1. "Are we just going to keep driving until our economic machine grinds to a complete halt?"

Yes.

This has been another edition of simple answers to simple questions (TM Atrios).

[Paganini]

2. Being Italian...,

Being Italian I can tell you they will come up with a very creative maybe even revolutionary solution but create untold layers of bureaucracy that will make it untenable. That is the Italian Government experience in a nutshell.

[hunter]

4. Here in California we "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle..."

... which only puts off the problem for another day, sorta like buying a Prius.

But the really big social restructuring that would close the landfills forever are not promoted because consumerism is still the National Religion. We solve our problems by buying stuff. Solutions that don't involve buying stuff are not promoted. It seems we'd much rather eat our fruit out of a recyclable plastic container than peel an orange or banana and compost the peel in our own back yard.

Opening new landfills is a bureaucratic nightmare. Probably the only thing that can save us from a Naples style crash is shipping our garbage out of state to places where the opposition to landfills is not so vocal or politically powerful, or the sort of grim economic downturn that makes even simple disposable items such as paper towels unaffordable for most people.

[razzleberry]

3. throw the garbage, into the volcano

problem solved

[hunter]

5. Make a big mound of dirt, dig a big hole in the top, put some big blowers in the base...

...throw the garbage in, and light off your own volcano! Admire the putrid plume of ash, and the molten lava of toxic slag flowing out of vents at the bottom.

Problem solved, just don't breath the air or drink the water.

[Nihil]

6. Suggest it to the Naples city council ...

They've already got the big holes full of garbage so all they need
is the big blowers and a match!

Mind you, if they've just been allowing the land-fills to build up
to surface level for years, there will be so many pockets of methane
in there already that it might be a Mount St.Helens event rather
than another Stromboli ...

:shrug:

[Javaman]

7. when the majority of the people on earth get a clue, two things will happen...

people will stop using plastic gewgaws and will compost. Until then we will smother under our own trash.

[Hoopla]

8. Trash does not have to pile up

Many people think solving our waste problem is generations away. But there are companies that are doing the impossible and they aren't the big ones. One such company is in my own county, a small privately held company in McMinnville TN called Bouldin Corporation. They have a process called WastAway that recycles up to 90% of the waste in Warren County (pop. 40,000), were they reside. They have been doing for the last four years! For those of you who know or who have been to the big Bonnaroo Music Festival in Manchester, TN, Bouldin Corporation began taking their waste stream last year and will do the same this year. Check it out on the Bonnaroo website at www.bonnaroo.com/2007-clean-vibes.

The best thing...we reduced our carbon emissions far beyond what the Kyoto Protocol mandates; our county has virtually eliminated our use of landfills (only sending bulky items like sofas and such to the landfills); they are a completely self-sufficient operation because the waste is converted to energy through a gasification process and excess can be sold to the national grid. Ethanol is supposedly next... Gee all this from our waste...and no subsidies.

See, America does still has the "know how" to do things THE RIGHT WAY with small entrepreneurs.

[NMDemDist2]

9. welcome to DU Hoopla!

:hi:

You may find our handy DU Glossary to be entertaining and helpful to understand many of the 'inside' jokes around here.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_oet&address=358x190

and thanks for the link but I'm not getting the page :shrug: