Following the Second World War, along with rising prosperity, the amount and quality of waste also changed>>>

Today, the Meseberg Climate Working Group met in Berlin. It is the second meeting of the Franco-German group, bringing together all ministries dealing with climate change measures under the lead of Climate State Secretaries Brune Poirson (FRA) and Jochen Flasbarth (DEU). The close collaboration across sectors responds to the mandate given by President Macron and Chancellor Merkel in June 2018 at Meseberg.

A report by Ecologic Institute and Climact shows that the draft National Energy and Climate Plans presented by governments at the start of 2019 are in acute need of improvement. They suffer from inadequate targets and insufficient details on the policies and financing needed to move towards net-zero emission economies in Europe. Member States also need to do better in involving their national stakeholders in providing input to the plans, to benefit from their expertise and to get them on board for future policies. Good practice examples exist around the EU to serve as inspiration for the final plans due by the end of the year.

Together with Mr. Thomas Schwarz (photo), Managing Director of Zweckverband Waste Management Region Hannover (aha) Werner Bauer and Dr. Karoline Borner, WtERT-Germany had the pleasure to visit the impressive photography exhibition "Ctrl-X, A topography of e-waste" of documentary photographer Kai Löffelbein in Hanover.

As a completion of the intensive cooperation of the export initiative Environmental Technologies "Sustainable Waste and Recycling Management in Croatia", a high-ranking 30-member delegation from Croatia visited Bavaria.

This annual report summarizes WtERT-Germany's activities, like the outcome of the website's relaunch, our consultancy projects in Croatia and Tunisia as well as hosting/delegation of guests in 2018. In addition, it gives a glimpse of what we are about to do in 2019.

Tracer Based Sorting is an innovative approach for waste Management enabling material or product sorting regardless of their physical properties. The technology is based on applying inorganic marker substances in ppm concentrations in or on the objects to be sorted. These substances can later be detected in the recycling process, serving either to remove contaminants or to recover valuable materials from the waste stream. Five German companies along with two universities and one associated networking partner are working on the pilot development of Tracer Based Sorting for plastic packaging recycling in a collaborative research Project.

Emission reduction in power plants.

Dr. Goran Rozing, Ferit and Werner Bauer, WtERT have decided to collaborate on future projects in Croatia.

Municipal waste treatment by incineration is both efficient in oxidation of the organic waste constituents and in destruction of organic pollutants whilst allowing for energy recovery. Heavy metals and other inorganic pollutants, however, cannot be destroyed by combustion. Under the change of reducing and oxidizing conditions in the furnace, they may change their form of binding. In reduced state or as chlorine compounds, several heavy metals such as lead, zinc, cadmium and others may temporarily volatilise into the gas phase and distribute between bottom ash, boiler ash and fly ash. The share volatilised will be disposed of with the boiler ash and with the flue gas cleaning residues. The share of heavy metals not volatilised remains in the incinerator bottom ash (IBA) and will contribute to the hazard potential.

The UNEP Minamata Agreement of 2013 has set itself the goal of reducing mercury emissions worldwide. The name comes from incidents in Minamata, Japan, where in the 1950s, about 3,000 people died of mercury poisoning due to the discharge of mercury-containing wastewater into the sea.