HAZARDOUS WASTES AND ECONOMIC RISK REDUCTION - CASE-STUDY, POLAND

A concise summary balance of industrial and hazardous waste is given, reflecting the situation in Poland. Nearly 130 million tonnes of waste were generated annually in the past in more than 1300 larger industri al plants. Approximately 1800 million tonnes of industrial waste is al ready stockpiled. The amount of hazardous waste generated per year was 0.3 and 1.0 million tonnes of the first and second class of toxicity, respectively. Seventeen existing on-site incinerators cannot treat th e whole amount of solid and hazardous waste generated. Therefore, land filling is still the most widely used method of waste disposal. Decont amination of the abandoned areas left by the Soviet Army, and reclamat ion of some hundreds of storage sites filled with outdated pesticides are now added to the national plan of waste management. Its implementa tion, including introduction of the best available and best managed te chnologies of hazardous waste treatment and disposal, will take at lea st 20 to 30 years.