Towards separate waste collection in Bucharest, Romania. A social acceptability approach

This research is meant to make waste managers aware of the fact that social acceptability is part of an Integrated and Sustainable Waste Management system and to offer them a method of work when addressing it. Its special focus is on Bucharest city, the capital of Romania, a city of over 2 million inhabitants, beginning now to deal with environmental problems in a sustainable way, but still struggling to do it in a proper manner. The Romanian legislation in the waste management field has been developed mainly in the last 10 years, according to the European Union one, and it imposes new and very demanding responsibilities for local authorities. For Bucharest, this means that a separate waste collection has to be developed and high targets have already been established. While addressing social acceptability of waste management schemes it has been noticed that if a scheme is developed on the basis of current needs and characteristics of a community and it is also supported and used by that community this leads to certain behaviour, affecting the efficiency of the scheme. Therefore, a scheme should be developed only by taking into account which are the factors that influence waste behaviour and also by considering the characteristics of the targeted population (which is actually one of the influencing factors). Consequently, waste behaviour is a key aspect of social acceptability and in this research social acceptability is looked at only from the behaviour point of view. Waste behaviour being the central element in influencing recycling, participation, contamination and illegal dumping rates in a waste collection scheme, it has been taken into consideration as the main important aspect to be targeted by waste managers in boosting separate waste collection results. As a result, waste behaviour determinants have been analysed, by developing a new integrative framework and using it within study-cases in the Netherlands (Rotterdam) and in Hungary (Budapest). Further, it was used for the assessment of the current situation in Romania in the waste management field, paying special attention to Bucharest city in this respect. As a result of literature and practice, waste behaviour determinants can be divided into situational (related to the system characteristics) and personal (related to the residents characteristics). The situational determinants include: facilities, economic instruments, communication and institutional arrangements. Personal factors category includes environmental concern; perceptions, awareness and knowledge; and household socioeconomic status and dwelling factors. However, the general conclusion is that there is no such thing as one best solution for organising a waste collection system, and a different mix of instruments and arrangements can lead to a new type of scheme. From the point of view of social acceptability, the overall recommendation for Bucharest is that the system should offer convenient facilities, easy to use, supported by appropriate economic instruments and promoted by good communication campaigns. Furthermore, considering the size of Bucharest and the complexity of its residential, economical, functional characteristics, along with the diversity in social characteristics, local authorities in Bucharest should consider different solutions for different neighbourhoods with homogenous characteristics.