Urban Planning, Ecological Transition, Urban Services and Housing

Selective waste containers will be grouped into islands from October.

Barcelona City Council is set to start a new cleaning and waste collection contract for the city in 2022. New aspects to the contract, and for areas where individualised systems such as door-to-door waste collection are not yet operative, include the roll-out of a new distribution model for waste containers in the streets.

The new system consists of using the same location for containers for organic waste (brown), rubbish (grey), packaging made of plastic, cans and tetrabrik (yellow), paper and cardboard (blue) and glass (green), and creating ‘islands’ with all types of waste collection containers wherever possible.

As from 18 October, part of the neighbourhoods of Fort Pienc and Dreta de l’Eixample will be used to trial this new model, which is to be rolled out citywide next year. The trial will take place in the area delimited by Gran Via, Passeig de Sant Joan and Av. Diagonal.

The distribution by islands will allow the city to:

• Reduce the total number of containers in public streets, gaining public space and cutting noise.
• Install up to 25% more selective waste containers (types of recyclable waste).
• Put containers for organic waste with the rest of the selective waste, making it easier for citizens to separate waste properly.

Goal for 2025: recycle 55% of all waste

Selective waste collection in Barcelona is currently at a standstill at 37.7%. The goal is for the new system to help push this percentage up and reach 55% by the year 2025.

Local campaign

In order to explain this change properly to citizens, a 16-strong team of environmental information staff will be visiting all homes and businesses in the area from 20 September to 8 October and providing a detailed map with the new locations for containers. Besides personalised visits, in the days leading up to the relocation of containers, information will be provided at container locations to explain the changes.

The change will be implemented between 18 and 31 October. Over the coming weeks and beyond, a campaign will help resolve doubts, prevent bad practice and gather data on how the new distribution model is performing.

Documents:

• Information leaflet
• Map of trial area