The Spanish Ministry for the Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge has recently published Order TED/834/2023, which came into force this 2 January establishing the minimum treatment requirements prior to depositing municipal waste in landfills.

One of the requirements of the aforementioned order establishes that the classification efficiency and stabilization assessment of the waste to be deposited in landfills must be carried out by ENAC-accredited inspection bodies according to the UNE-EN ISO/IEC 17020 standard, while the corresponding analytical determinations must be carried out by ENAC-accredited laboratories according to the UNE-EN ISO/IEC 17025 standard.

As stated in the order, "the treatment prior to dumping has a double purpose: on the one hand, it pursues the resource’s maximum use contained in the waste by mechanical recovery and, on the other hand, by means of biological treatment, it enables the dumped waste's appropriate behaviour. Therefore, effective waste treatment for depositing in landfill must take both the organic matter content of the mechanically treated waste and the waste’s degree of stability in the biological treatment into account”.

ENAC is already in a position to receive accreditation applications from laboratories and inspection bodies interested in operating in accordance with Order TED 834/2023. For further information, please contact Delia Gutiérrez, from ENAC's Environment Department.

Order TED 834/2023 is yet another example of the confidence the Spanish Public Administration places in ENAC's accreditation to achieve its public policy objectives on waste management and environmental protection. This confidence was previously evident in 2020, with the publication of RD 646/2020 on waste disposal by landfill, which established that waste characteristics and environmental controls in landfills had to be carried out by ENAC-accredited inspection bodies.