22-12-2008

As recently as summer, piles of it burned nightly in the streets, a product of overflowing dumps and just the latest chapter of the perennial "garbage state of emergency" in Italy first declared by the European Union in 1994. Rome responded back then by nationalizing the dumps, which were controlled by the powerful local mafia, and appointing a special garbage commissioner with his own budget and total authority. A host of men have held the post, five since 2000 alone. All have arrived at more or less the same conclusion -- the region must build new dumps and reopen old ones. That approach, though, has merely prolonged the problem and ensured the survival of their own bureaucracy, which has already spent more than €2 billion. A recent report by the Italian parliament lambasted the office's work as a "harmful illusion," claiming the commissioners had squandered taxpayer money and failed to fix the problem. The European Union is pursuing infringement proceedings against Italy for its alleged violations of Brussels' waste mangement regulations. And the outrage that sparked a major crisis earlier this year continues to simmer.

An incinerator in nearby Acerra, which would be the only one in the Campania region, has been under construction for more than 10 years. In May, the CEO and employees at Impregilo, the private company contracted to build the incinerator and manage Campania's waste, were arrested in a probe into fraud, abuse of power and "breach of trust in environmental matters" that named over 25 people, including Antonio Bassolino, the regional governor who has also served as trash czar. Further probes involve two other former commissioners. Meanwhile, a new company took over the incinerator contract in October.

Officials in the office of Campania Governor Bassolino, who was mayor of Naples before becoming governor in 2000 and served as garbage commissioner between 2002 and 2004, blame the tumultuous social and political climate for the local trash impasse, saying those who took the risk of making difficult and unpopular decisions are now being put on trial for them.

"(There have been) protests against landfills ... the incinerators, even against the plants for sorting. They're protesting against anything and everything," Bassolino said. He claims politicians from both the left and the right have used opposition to the plant to drum up support. The mafia seems capable of profiting no matter what happens. It runs collection and transportation and makes a fortune illegally stuffing toxic industrial waste into dumps or by simply burying it in the countryside. A 2007 World Health Organization report found a steep increase in cancer and fetal defects, compared with the rest of the country, for those living near the region's illegal waste sites. The decision to continue building the new dump in Chiaiano even after the discovery of illegal asbestos deposits there in late October triggered the most recent protest in November.

Silvio Berlusconi made cleaning up Naples a central promise of his new government, which took over in early May, and the streets are now clean. He declared the crisis over by July. This has meant shipping waste to places like Sardinia and Germany, plans for new incinerators and, as always, new dumps. The proposed dump in Chiaiano has become one of the most important strategic sites in Campania. "It represents, along with other facilities, the will of the city of Naples to do its part in dealing with a problem so serious," Bassolino said, applauding the strict enforcement measures that have been enacted to fight resistance to the project. A new law makes dumps and incinerators places of national interest and disrupting their progress punishable by up to four years in jail. The army has been posted permanently inside the Chiaiano site. But that hasn't stopped the unrest that seems to break out every time a new facility is announced -- in part because nobody wants garbage in their backyard, and no less because people have lost faith in the government's ability to fix the problem.

Since the plans for the site were announced in April, there have been nightly meetings at "Titanic" -- a weed-ridden traffic island with a ship's mast in the middle -- to coordinate a constant campaign against it. This has included guerrilla protests like "soft-walking" in large groups over crosswalks to halt traffic, petitions and demonstrations like the one in November, which started and ended there. "This is our garrison," says Serena Kaiser, a student who lives in Chiaiano, pointing to a shack built along the sidewalk to fight the cold. After the first big event on May 23, protestors set up a blockade of dumpsters at Titanic on the road leading to the dump. Some sat behind it, hands in the air, women and children in front to deter the platoon of police and carabinieri. Kaiser was with her family about five yards from the barricade. The police marched through all at once, batons swinging, as if on an order to attack. She says a police officer threw her off to the side and another clubbed her father in the hand as he tried to film the scene.

In the blasted-out quarry below, workers in orange and yellow vests scurry around a yellow crane. This spot and 13 others are being hollowed out to make room for the new Chiaiano dump. The government insists that just one hectare of the 2,500 in Parco Collina, the last natural park within the city limits, will be used for garbage, but at least 200 families and farmers will lose parts of their land to make way for the access roads and other logistical needs. People worry about having trash so near their water supply and within 1.6 kilometers of five local hospitals. "It's a crime to put a dump so near the houses where people live and so near hospitals," says Salvatore Perrotta, the mayor of neighboring Marano. "This couldn't happen anywhere else in the world." Environmental impact reports ordered prior to construction concluded the dump would be safe. But residents don't trust the government, and the fact that the site has been sealed off by the military has only further stoked their suspicions. The man with the moustache passes his binoculars and points to a spot in the dirt. There is a stain of blue powder, a possible mark of asbestos. Residents say they watched as the toxic waste was turned up with the ground at the end of October and then reburied, covered with large sheets of black tarp.

The protestors posted photo and video on their Web site. In early November, the respected national daily La Repubblica cited the army general in charge of digging with admitting that asbestos had been uncovered. The European Commission's environmental arm has begun closely monitoring the situation, according to its spokeswoman Barbara Helfferich. "It is difficult to know how exactly the Italian authorities are dealing with the problem, as officials always invoke 'state secret' whenever local NGOs or even local authorities ask to access information about the site," says Monica Frassoni, an Italian member of the European Parliament. "The population in Campania is tired of seeing the old illegal landfills, often filled with very toxic waste, still lying there, un-remedied and un-cleaned, while being asked to bear with more landfills to come."

Down the road at a family owned cherry farm that dates back over 300 years, Di Guida Ciro finds his name on a list of those who will lose land. He points to the dumpsite just beyond his back porch and asks why this must be the solution. At the infamous waste compound in Giugliano just northwest of the city, towering mounds covered with black tarp fill fields that seem to stretch on forever. They're called eco-balls -- giant bales of compressed solid and liquid waste that have not been properly separated -- and they are being stored here until the incinerators open. When they finally do, there's already enough trash here to keep the incinerators burning for years.

Jeremy Rifkin, the founder and president of the Foundation on Economic Trends and a respected voice on applying science and technology to find ways to help protect the environment, came to Naples late last month for a conference on innovation. "Innovation is key," he said of the trash crisis. "When you run out of dumping sites, there's got to be a Plan B." But for years Plan B has been burning, and finding places to store that waste until the incineration facilities can be completed. At least three more incinerators are scheduled for construction in Campania. Like the one in Acerra, they will be paid for by CIP 6, the revenue from the six-percent tax Italians pay on their annual energy bills that is earmarked for renewable energy. The definition controversially includes the power produced by incineration, which can be sold by the companies running the sites. Though the region recently allocated €150 million in development funds for 10 new composting plants and other recycling facilities, far more money -- about €2 billion across the country a year -- comes from CIP 6. When Impregilo was tight on cash last year, it used the eco-balls as leverage to borrow money from the banks, which are heavily invested in the waste problem through years of loans.

All incinerators must meet EU regulations, meaning there's little health risk. But burning is ideally the last stop in the waste cycle, with sorting and recycling in between. Campania has the worst sorting rate in the country; all of the waste that could have been recycled, meanwhile, is permitted to be burned. "As long as burning waste is more convenient, or even profitable, compared to recycling, can we really expect a serious waste policy based on prevention, reduction and recycling to be put in place?" Frassoni asks. With financial and political stakes this high, even the most dedicated protesters know they're unlikely to change their fate. "Sometimes we feel like we are tilting at windmills," says dump opponent Kaiser.