Treviso (Italy)

The city of Treviso (Italy) fully introduced the PAYT system in its territory in 2014 and since then waste fees of the 85,000 residents are calculated 60 % based on the number of people living in the same household and 40 % varies according to the amount of mixed waste collected. The introduction of the PAYT system, from a system with flat-rate waste fees, increased the separate collection rate in Treviso by about 25%, from 55% to 80% (between September 2013 and December 2014). Over the same period of time, the production of mixed waste decreased from 20 kg/resident/month to 6 kg/resident/month. When introducing the PAYT system, the waste management company (Contarina) defined three different areas in the territory of the city, each of them with similar urban characteristics, in order to better tailor the waste management services. Moreover, three levels of architectural complexity of buildings were defined for each of the three urban areas, depending on the type of building and space available to store bins. Based on these two factors, Contarina delivered to households bins of different size (i.e. 120L or smaller) and developed the waste collection system (i.e. calendar of collection and type of collection). Each bin is identified during waste collection thanks to an electronic device that allows charging household based on the amount of mixed waste produced.

The average waste fee per household in Treviso in 2015, thanks to PAYT but also other measures (e.g. door-to-door collection), was 186€ while the average Italian waste fee was 305€. Therefore, PAYT proofs to be a system that allows substantial savings in the waste fees for households. Moreover, in Treviso, discounts  are  applied to the waste fee  if  home  composting  is implemented,  while  an  increase  in  the  tariff  is  applied  if  the  household also delivers green cuttings to the waste management system.

When adopting a PAYT system, a well-developed and targeted communication campaign for residents is required. In the case of Treviso, when introducing the PAYT system, the communication campaign included emotional and engaging posters displayed in public spaces and shops, technical and specific leaflets and booklets for households explaining in detail the new waste collection system and public events and meetings with residents in order to address questions and concerns.

The adoption of a PAYT system can induce illegal dumping if in adjacent municipalities door-to-door collection and/or PAYT are not implemented, especially in municipalities where the separate collection rate is relatively low. Therefore, a coordination of policies at a macro level is needed to avoid this undesired effect. In the neighbour municipalities of Treviso waste management is carried out by the same waste management company adopting the same collection system and this helped reducing side effects to the introduction of PAYT.

 

Sources:

http://edizionicafoscari.unive.it/media/pdf/books/978-88-6969-202-4/978-88-6969-202-4-ch-10.pdf

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/sjoe.12122