Waste management
Vienna - one of the cleanest cities in the world
The City of Vienna attaches the utmost importance to cleanliness in all of the city's quarters and residential areas, because in Vienna it is a well known fact that a city's cleanliness attributes significantly to one's feeling of personal safety, thus benefiting the quality of life. This is why around 3,000 employees work day and night to ensure that people in Vienna can live in a clean and beautiful environment - a major challenge in itself, which the City of Vienna is taking on to ensure Vienna remaining one of the cleanest and thus most liveable cities in the world.
A lot to keep clean
The City's municipal department responsible for keeping Vienna clean, MA48, manages the whole process of waste management. Within the city limits that includes not only ensuring that the municipal waste management system runs smoothly, but also making sure that Vienna's roads are icefree in winter, thus safe to use. Within Vienna there are about 2,800 km of roads that have to be cleaned regularly. That is by no means the only task the employees of the municipal waste disposal service have to manage every day,. With around 10,000 disposals per day, MA48 takes care of the collection of residual waste paper, regular waste bins and organic waste. Not only are private garbage bins emptied, public garbace bins, public ash pipes, which are located at street corners, thousands of dog poo bag dispensers, 13 waste disposal sites and almost 100 sites for collecting hazardous waste throughout the city are emptied as well. In total, MA48 collects 1.2 million tons of waste every day.
Vienna makes it easy to separate waste
The best waste is the waste, which is not produced at all. However, as waste has become an integral part of our modern world, the City of Vienna is pursuing two goals: Firstly, to ensure that as little waste as possible is produced. Secondly, it should be made as easy as possible for the Viennese populace to separate waste correctly, since it has become cristal clear that separating waste is definitely worth it, both for the environment and for one's own wallet. The Viennese collect no less than 350,000 tons of waste materials every year - from glass bottles, waste paper and food cans to old cooking oil and plastic packaging, making a significant contribution to the circular economy and the conservation of resources. Even waste, that cannot be recycled, has added value as it is thermally recycled in Vienna's waste incineration plants, providing valuable energy such as electricity and heat.
In Vienna, waste becomes energy
In Vienna, all residual waste is thermally recycled in four waste incineration plants, producing district heating, district cooling and electricity. Over 330,000 households and more than 6,500 large corporate customers are supplied with district heating. The waste incineration plant at Pfaffenau alone generates electricity for 25,000 households and district heating for 50,000 households. In addition, nutrient-rich compost is produced from organic waste and biogas from kitchen waste.
More information at:
City of Vienna - Waste Management (Municipal Department 48)