- Ausdruck vom: 30.07.2010, 19:25:19 Uhr
- Quelle: http://www.retech-germany.net/180
All the support given to the user groups (German companies, universities, planning offices etc.) should be geared towards enabling these organisations to achieve their objectives by themselves. The initiative should not be mistaken for one that creates new subsidy opportunities. Existing support and investment assistance are merely facilitated by the initiative in order to provide the necessary impetus for export activity. This, however, should then pay for itself.
Standard waste management solutions cannot be applied across the board outside Germany. Irrespective of the global requirements for climate protection, energy saving, energy efficiency and sustainable development, the following principle should apply: when determining the "right" strategic direction for each target region’s waste management policy, the main issue should be to ascertain, in each case, the stage of development it has reached in terms of environmental protection and waste management, while also taking account of the conditions in the region (environmental behaviour, the composition of its waste, its legal bases and their implementation, its economic development, its waste disposal market, its pricing models etc.). Political facilitation and support for across-the-board solutions cannot be justified by the arguments and opinions of experts, e.g. about issues such as "end-of-pipe or recycling", "mechanical-biological treatment of waste or incineration", "materials recycling or energy recovery", which have been and are still being debated intensively in our country. For example, from the perspective of German and European environmental policy (and with regard to the future), disposing of waste in domestic landfill sites is clearly the very last option in the waste management hierarchy, and in practice, cannot be viewed in isolation from the systems for separation of waste, recyclable materials collection and organic waste recycling.
However, this scenario does not (yet) exist in most of the developing countries and could only be established gradually in lengthy processes. For this reason, it would seem sensible to pursue "modest" but feasible waste management goals which, although insufficient by our standards, would bring about a significant improvement compared to the status quo: the better solution rather than the optimum one. Nevertheless, developing and raising technical standards should always be the core of our strategic focus. Adhering to technical standards for the collection, treatment and disposal of waste has a direct impact by improving environmental standards and helps to internalise unwanted external effects. It also opens the door to the possibility of selling innovative or adapted environmental technologies, depending on local conditions in the specific country.
Synergies are best achieved in a core area (selected countries and regions). German providers have implemented individual projects or gained experience in virtually every country in the world. To enable the initiative to concentrate on a core area in which the best outcomes are expected (raising ecological standards, scientific and economic successes), it is now vital to find the common denominator in these overseas activities.
The focus should be less on the restrictive handling of valuable information and more on broadening and applying our knowledge. In the face of international competition, it is essential to retain and develop both our informational advantage and the technological knowledge that has been "made in Germany". However, in a globalised knowledge-based society, this may prove increasingly difficult to achieve by means of restrictive measures. A restrictive information policy, through the imposition of conditions, user restrictions and charges, etc. would not be feasible in many practical situations and may also not constitute a real barrier to foreign competitors. It would be more important to safeguard the aforementioned advantage in the long term by generating new application-oriented knowledge. The German universities and research institutions, and also engineering firms and plant construction companies in the SME sector, have a key role to play here. The challenge for the future is to provide the most efficient services possible within the different framework conditions, and to tailor these services to the specific needs of the different countries.
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