Urban solid waste management: a study in the cities of Rio Grande do Sul state

Abstract

The law establishing the National Solid W Abstract: aste Policy was sanctioned in 2010, in order to regulate the recycling and waste management discipline and it will lead to a series of changes for consumers, companies and government. In order to evaluate the impacts that will be generated with the new law, this study aimed to analyze the management of Urban Solid Waste (USW) in three cities of Rio Grande do Sul state. It was carried out an exploratory qualitative research, which identified as the main results the outsourcing practices of household and public waste collection and the final disposal of the waste in sanitary landfills. In most of the cities researched the deposits are disabled and they have recyclable sorting units. It was possible to notice, however, the lack of financial and legal incentives to install and keep these units, as well as the difficulty in joining the recyclable markets and install cooperatives for the management of materials. It should also be noticed that the researched cities do not have a master plan for waste. In general, the actions are carried out in an unsystematic manner, showing that many practices still have to be developed for the alignment of municipal management to the guidelines of this new law.