The Italian rubbish shipment, held up at the dockside while analysts determine the safety of the contents, can now be carted off and dumped in a Portuguese landfill site.
The rubbish suddenly has become quite safe to be buried in Portugal, (why not in Italy ask many readers?) and represents the first of many shipments of domestic waste from the Naples region that will be buried here.
Random sampling of the first 2,700 tonnes of Italian waste in the €1 million contract had shown unacceptable levels of ‘dissolved organic carbon’ which could leach into water systems and bond with trace metals, creating water-soluble complexes.
It’s now as if this first report had never existed. The rubbish is perfectly safe, with the ministry of the environment saying the shipment can proceed and the misnamed environment agency saying the dumping ground is ready and waiting, both hoping nobody was paying much attention to the affair over the Christmas and New Year break.
The rubbish had been checked and categorised before it had left Italy but nobody really believed the paperwork as the Neapolitan rubbish collection service is said to be ‘controlled by the local mafia.’
The importer of the first shipment due to be buried in the landfill site near Setúbal was found to be owned by the former Secretary of State for the Environment, Dr Pedro Afonso de Paulo who clearly has no interest in the environment now that he is out of office.
The only party that seems remotely interested is The Greens who have complained that money is treated with more reverence than the environment.
The bigger question remains – why is Italian rubbish being buried in Portugal?
