As a nation we exploit green landscape for commercial gain, but most Irish people show little inclination towards reducing the ever increasing amounts of waste placed outside doors and workplaces for dispatch to dumps. Appealing to aesthetic instincts does not prevent the blind eye being turned on landfills which tarnish and pollute.
Local authorities have continued to use landfill in the mistaken belief it is the only low-cost waste-disposal option. They have shown token appreciation of the need to recycle or reuse waste, and even less of the new technology now available to do it in an environmentally safe way.
The refuse mountains were guaranteed to continue their relentless rise in such circumstances. The result is what the bureaucrats call "unsustainable environmental management". For the consumer/polluter, that reads "a waste crisis, needing to be addressed sooner rather than later".
The scale of the problem (notably, no success at waste reduction nationally); a poor record of recycling (we recycle only 8 per cent of waste, the second-lowest rate in the EU); and the extent to which we have fallen behind more progressive European countries in adopting environmentally-appropriate waste "use" technology warrant a radical approach. The urgency becomes apparent when scientific evidence of the health effects of living beside landfills and the extent of pollution caused by poorly maintained and managed dumps is addressed. In any event, EU legislation was not going to countenance a continuing reliance on dumps.
The Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, has unveiled a framework with which a deplorable record may be dramatically improved in the long term. The outlook in the medium term is bleaker, such is our dependence on landfill.
Consumers, nonetheless, will soon be forced down the road of waste separation in the home: segregation of biodegradable waste, paper/packaging, bottles and aluminium cans.
Anything going towards landfill will be heavily taxed per volume/ weight (many countries already use refuse trucks with on-board weighing systems). Waste reduction will be "incentivised" and charges varied according to usage.
The days of local authorities issuing "general statements of intent" on changing from landfill are over. Mr Dempsey told county and city managers this in no uncertain terms yesterday.
Equally, recycling services will become widely available in urban areas after many false dawns, although their financing may remain precarious for some time.
The absence of significant "financial barriers" to landfill or subsidies for paper reuse makes recycling unviable, according to the chief executive of Smurfit Recycling, Mr John O'Loughlin.
He confirmed yesterday that his company sends old newspapers to China but makes no money on the trade. In such a business climate, the company had over the past 18 months significantly reduced the volumes of paper to be recycled, a timely reminder of recycling reality.
Changing our ways will depend on the extent to which charges reflecting the full cost of waste collection and disposal are applied to those who generate waste; and a proper recycling infrastructure will have to be put in place by local authorities.
As Earthwatch noted after the policy was announced, a crude yet simple landfill tax, as applied in the UK, would be an effective way of giving local authorities and waste-producers a real financial incentive to reduce waste at source.
Ambitious targets for waste reduction and recycling may be set, but absence of a proper recycling infrastructure may render them meaningless for years to come.