Waste management lies at a crucial interconnection between Science, Technology, Sociology and Economy. Not only does waste require Science and Technology for proper management, but also strategies and behaviours that can adequately handle its impact, promote its use as a resource and give evidence to values and costs. This session focuses on the latest developments in the interdisciplinary, unconventional area aimed at accomplishing a positive vision of waste. For which the capability of communicating what are the real issues at stake has become an overwhelming requirement.

Waste management lies at a crucial interconnection between Science, Technology, Sociology and Economy. Not only does waste require Science and Technology for proper management, but also strategies and behaviours that can adequately handle its impact, promote its use as a resource and give evidence to values and costs. This session focuses on the latest developments in the interdisciplinary, unconventional area aimed at accomplishing a positive vision of waste. For which the capability of communicating what are the real issues at stake has become an overwhelming requirement.

A special panel session coordinated by Prof. Antonio Massarutto will investigate the economic regulation of waste management, which is becoming a relevant topic especially in Italy.
After an overview concerning the regulation of waste management tariffs, a round table with institutional guests of the AGCM (Italian Competition Authority), the AEEGSI (Italian Regulatory Authority for Electricity Gas and Water), UTILITALIA, ATERSIR Emila Romagna, HERAMBIENTE and CONAI will follow up. At the end of the round table, the Italian Minister of the Environment will give the closing speech of the economic session.

This session will focus on the potentiality of circular economy in reducing the environmental impacts associated  with waste management and in increasing the efficient use of resources, through reuse and recycling. At the same time, the critical issues of this approach will be analysed, such as the quality of recycled materials and their actual use in the market, the data availability for the calculation of reuse and recycling targets, and the implementation of effective prevention strategies.

This track covers both state-of-the-art energy recovery from waste, and the most recent trends of the sector. Case studies, innovative technologies and scientific studies will be presented. The themes of energy efficiency, environmental and economic sustainability of waste to energy technologies will be discussed also in the light of the next changes in the normative framework.

This session will be devoted to processes and technologies for material recovery from waste, with a focus on emerging critical issues, and on generation and management of process residues. Focus is on materials from separate collection, organic fractions intended for material recovery and residues from energy recovery treatments.