The trash trail – Part One: George Clooney’s rubbish

The trash trail – Part One: George Clooney’s rubbish

Some couples go shopping together. Some go to the cinema or out for a romantic meal. Others (read: my other half and I) think it's great fun to spend a morning touring Case Passerini, a rubbish-processing plant on the outskirts of Florence.   Case Passerini processes Florence's

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Wed 09 Sep 2009 10:00 PM

Some couples go shopping together. Some go to the
cinema or out for a romantic meal. Others (read: my other half and I) think
it’s great fun to spend a morning touring Case Passerini, a rubbish-processing
plant on the outskirts of Florence.

 

Case Passerini processes Florence’s rifiuti
indifferenziati (non-recyclable waste) and rifiuti organici (organic
waste). Quadrifoglio, the company that
collects much of the city’s rubbish, runs Case Passerini, and it is one of the
largest private businesses in Florence.

 

The plant is in Sesto Fiorentino. At the sight of
Brunelleschi’s dome, majestic in the morning mist as I looked into the distance
from the plant’s car park, I took a deep breath. Then quickly wished I hadn’t.
Despite the plant’s system for washing’ the air before pumping it outside,
there is still an unmistakable eau-de-rot aroma.

 

In the morning we spent with our friendly guides,
Franco Cristo, direttore smaltimento, and Gianni Donnino, direttore
dell’impianto, it became increasingly clear that both are passionate about
rubbish. After helping us don luminous vests and hard hats (no masks,
unfortunately), our guides showed us round the plant’s nerve centre, a James
Bond-esque control room full of levers and ominous big red buttons. Flashing
screens monitor the plant’s machines and track the stages of decomposition of
the organic waste.

 

Then we followed the path of the tons of rubbish that
arrive here every day. Non-recyclable trash is first unloaded into an enormous
pit where the air has a suffocating, fetid humidity. From this deep trough, an
enormous claw called the ragno (the spider) lifts loads of rubbish and
drops them into the first of a series of chopping machines. Pointing out some
highly inappropriate rubbish, such as an old bicycle and a mattress, Franco
explained that this initial chopping phase reduces all the rubbish into more
homogenous pieces.

 

As we watched, a small truck appeared and discharged
some rubbish next to the pit. Franco crouched and split open a greasy bag. He
explained that this rubbish came from door-to-door organic waste collection in
the centre of Florence.
However, this oozing mess was clearly not only organic waste: there was also
plastic, tin and paper. Franco riffled through a bag and pulled out a receipt
with the name of a restaurant on it. He shook his head, put the receipt in his
pocket and we moved on.

 

As part of the processing of mixed trash, metallic
materials are magnetically extracted and sent to be recycled with the plastic,
metal, glass and paper, which are treated separately. At this point, as much
organic waste as possible is filtered out using a wonderfully simple technique:
pass the rubbish over an 8cm diameter hole and the majority of organic waste
falls through the hole, whereas the non-organic waste passes over the top. The
system, while good, is not perfect, so the next stage is to let the organic
matter turn into compost to cover the nearby dump, a rectangular hill next to the
motorway just past Ikea.

 

Now the remaining rubbish is pushed though another
grinder and checked again for metal, rumbling through the plant on a series of
noisy, criss-crossing conveyor belts from ground level to the ceiling, all of
which seem to end in vicious, gnashing teeth. It’s at this point in the process
that the rubbish reveals most vividly current cultural habits. The floor under
the conveyor belts is littered with small plastic cups that, on closer
inspection, turn out to be the tiny containers used by that famous make of
coffee machine-the one George Clooney apparently loves. The cups litter every
nook and cranny of the plant. Reels of video tape tangle in the conveyor belts
and hang down places like oily seaweed. Nobody watches videos anymore,
explained Franco, and so they end up here.

 

Now a jet of air separates light and heavy bits. The
heavier rubbish is compressed and sent to the dump. The light rubbish (known as
fluff’) is pressed into bales called CDR (combustibile derivato dai rifiuti,
or refuse-derived fuel). After several stages of analysis, the CDR bales are
sent to produce energy through burning. Our guides explained that with the
technology available today incinerators pose fewer risks and cause considerably
less damage than does dumping.

 

It’s cold comfort to know that the city’s
non-recyclable rubbish is filtered to some degree. The organic waste extracted
isn’t pure’ enough for commercial use, and burning CDR bales is an
environmentally questionable solution. But the rubbish does not end up in one
huge hole in the ground.

 

Why should we care? Nationally, only 27.5 percent of
all rubbish is recycled, far short of the Italian government’s legislated goal
of 40 percent, set in 2007. Statistics gathered by the Agenzia Regionale per la Protezione Ambientale
della Toscana show that although Tuscany recycles at a rate higher than the
national average, the region produces more waste in the first place. Educating
the public and instilling habits in the young is one part of the solution
(Mayor Renzi has suggested that teaching children about separating rubbish
should be a priority). However, understanding what happens to the refuse each
one of us produces is a big step towards taking responsibility.

 

 

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