1.3        Geographical assessment

Although renewable municipal solid waste, which is the fourth biggest source of renewable electricity, is reported by IEA to constitute 2.1% of the renewable electricity generation in 2000, this assessment is claimed to be rather controversial. Some countries acknowledge waste to be a renewable source of energy, while others do not, excluding waste from their statistics. The other reason for the controversy is that data are often estimates rather than observations, since the energy classification systems of many countries do not permit the exact separation of renewable and non-renewable municipal solid waste. So far there has been no systematic and proper data collection, so figures most often do not make a distinction between renewable and non-renewable producers. As a result assessments should be used with reservation.

Data collected by IEA strongly suggest that both industrial waste and non-renewable solid waste have experienced an increase between 1990 and 2000. In 2000, industrial waste and non-renewable municipal solid waste generated 1.2% of the OECD renewable electricity (here production from non-renewable waste is exceptionally included in the definition of renewable electricity).

Most of the 13 589 GWh of industrial waste electricity is produced in two countries. The largest provider is the United States with 6 552 GWh (48.2% of total), followed by Germany with 3 946 GWh (29.0% of total). The Netherlands represents the third largest producer, with 935 GWh in 2000. In 2000, 4 826 GWh of electricity were generated from non-renewable municipal solid waste. Almost the entire amount was produced by the following four countries: Germany (1 660 GWh), Netherlands (1 398 GWh), Switzerland (717 GWh) and the United Kingdom (409 GWh).

Source: Environmental Teaching Resources

31 554 GWh of electricity were produced from renewable solid municipal waste in the OECD in 2000. By far the biggest producer of electricity from renewable solid municipal waste is the United States, generating 15 653 GWh in 2000 (49.6% of OECD production). The second largest producer is Japan, with a production of 5 209 GWh. With 2 028 GWh Germany represents the third largest producer. The remaining electricity production from renewable municipal solid waste is spread among smaller producers in OECD Europe. Denmark has experienced the highest growth, increasing its production with an annual growth rate of 35.8% from 47 GWh in 1990 to 1 000 GWh in 2000.