LAW OF THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA

of July 29, 2016 No. 209

About waste

The parliament adopts this organic law.

Chapter I. General provisions

Article 1. Subject and scope

(1) This law establishes the legal basis, state policy and necessary environmental measures and health of the population by prevention or reduction of the negative impact caused by education and waste management and reducing general impact of expenditure of resources, and also increase in efficiency of their use.

(2) Provisions of this law do not extend on:

a) gaseous emissions in the atmosphere;

b) the soil (in the location), including not extracted contaminated soil and firmly the structures connected with the earth;

c) the uncontaminated soil and other natural materials extracted in the course of construction works if these materials are held for use in their natural state on the site from where they were taken;

d) radioactive waste;

e) the deactivated explosives;

f) fecal materials if they do not fall under action of Item b) parts (3), the straw and other harmless natural materials of agricultural or forestry and landscape origin and materials used in rural or forestry or for energy production from biomass safe for the environment and health of the population by methods or methods.

(3) In part in which are regulated by other legal acts are excluded from scope of this law:

a) sewage;

b) offal of animal origin, including the processed products, except for the products which are subject to burning, warehousing or use in installations for biogas production or compost;

c) carcasses of the died animals except for slaughtered including carcasses of the animals destroyed for the purpose of eradication of the epizooty and destroyed according to regulations of the veterinary and sanitary legislation;

d) the waste which is formed as a result of researches, production, conversion and storage of mineral resources, and also operation of pits.

(4) Without prejudice to the obligations provided by other applicable legal acts, the deposits placed in surface water for the purpose of water resources management and waterways or prevention of floods, mitigation of the consequences of floods and drought or sanitary cleaning of lands do not fall under operation of this law in the presence of proofs that these deposits are harmless.

(5) Management of certain categories of waste is regulated by other legal acts and regulations approved by the Government developed based on this law and international treaties which party is the Republic of Moldova.

Article 2. Concepts

For the purpose of this law the following concepts are used:

1) nature protection permission to waste management – the allowing document issued by the Agency of the environment subordinated to body of the central public management in the field of the environment, resolving implementation of activities for waste management according to this law;

2) biological waste – biologically decomposed landscape gardening waste, food wastes or kitchen garbage of households, restaurants, catering firms or shops of retail trade comparable to the waste received at the companies for conversion of food products;

3) the broker – any physical person or legal entity which is engaged in conversion or waste disposal for others, including brokers who are not the actual owners of waste;

4) the best available methods (BAM) – the most advanced and effective developments registered at this stage of development for different types of activities, processes and methods of functioning which testify to practical feasibility of use of certain methods as base for establishment of maximum permissible emissions / dumpings of pollutants, and also other conditions of issue of permission for the purpose of prevention of pollution or if prevention is impossible, for reducing emissions/dumpings and impact on the environment in general:

a) methods – include as the used technology, and methods of designing, construction, servicing, operation, and also conclusion from operation of installation and measure for recovery of the site according to the legislation in the field of environmental assessment;

b) available – belong to the methods which reached the level allowing to implement them in the relevant sector of the industry on condition of economic and technical justification taking into account costs and benefits regardless of whether these methods at the national level, and on condition of their availability to the operator on acceptable conditions are used and take root;

c) the best – belong to the most effective methods of achievement of high level of environmental protection in general;

5) collection – withdrawal of waste, including their sorting and preliminary storage for transportation to installation on processing;

6) separate collection – withdrawal during which waste, similar on structure and characteristics, are stored separately for the purpose of simplification of process of their specific processing;

7) the businessman – any physical person or legal entity which performs activities on its own behalf for the purpose of acquisition and the subsequent sale of waste, including businessmen who are not the actual owners of waste;

8) polygon of waste – the place of export of waste for the purpose of their placement on the Earth's surface or underground (underground storage warehouses), including:

– internal rooms for export of waste (the producer of waste builds own storage for waste disposal on site of their production); and

– permanent places (for the term of more than one year) which are used for temporary storage of waste.

Do not treat polygons of waste:

a) sites of unloading of waste for ensuring their preparation for further transportation for the purpose of recuperation, processing or export to other place;

b) sites of storage of waste before their recuperation for the purpose of processing for the term of, as a rule, no more than three years or before export for the term of no more than one year;

9) waste – any substances or objects which the owner throws out or intends or shall throw out;

10) municipal waste – the consumer wastes received in households, and which are formed as a result of the implementation of business, industrial and administrative activity similar waste, specified in line item 20 Lists of waste approved by the Government;

11) dangerous wastes – the waste having one or several dangerous properties listed in appendix 3;

12) the owner of waste – the producer of waste or physical person or legal entity in which ownership they are;

13) removal – the activities other than transaction for conversion of waste even if one of by-product is recuperation of substances or energies. Appendix 1 contains list of transactions on removal;

14) the analysis of product lifecycle – environmental impact assessment as a result of production, distribution, sale and use of product, including its conversion and removal, including energy use, the raw materials and waste which are formed when implementing any of the specified types of activity;

15) waste management – collection, transportation, conversion and waste disposal, including supervision of these transactions and the subsequent servicing of places for removal, including the actions which are carried out by the businessman or the broker;

16) preparation for reutilization – transaction on check, cleaning or conversion by means of repair as a result of which the products or their components which acquired the status of waste are prepared for reutilization without any other transaction on preliminary processing;

17) prevention – the measures taken before substance material or product become waste, for the purpose of reducing:

a) the number of waste, including by reutilization of products or prolongation of their lifecycle;

b) negative impact which is made by waste on the environment and health of the population; or

c) hazardous substance content in materials and products;

18) the producer of waste – person, whose activities leads to formation of waste (primary producer of waste), or person who performs preliminary processing, mixing or other transactions as a result of which characteristics or structure of this waste change;

19) recirculation – any transaction on conversion of waste by means of which waste will be transformed to products, the materials or substances intended for accomplishment of the initial functions or for their use in other purposes. This concept includes repeated processing of organic materials, except for receipts of energy and conversion for the purpose of use of materials in fuel quality or for transactions on backfilling;

20) recuperation – any transaction by means of which material or substance which otherwise would be lost is recovered/is extracted again;

21) regeneration of waste oils – recirculation process by means of which basic oils can be received by purification of waste oils, in particular by department of the contaminating impurity, products of oxidation and the additives containing in them;

22) reutilization – any transaction by means of which the products or their components which did not become waste are reused in the same purposes for which were made;

23) processing – transactions on conversion or removal, including the preliminary preparation preceding conversion or removal;

24) waste oils – all types of mineral oils or synthetic lubricants or technical oils which became unsuitable for initial purpose;

25) conversion – any transaction as a result of which waste serves the useful purpose by replacement of other materials which would be used in particular purposes or waste is prepared for the answering purpose at the companies or in economy in general. The List of transactions on conversion of waste is given in appendix 2.

Article 3. Hierarchy of waste and method of its application

(1) the Hierarchy of waste applied within the legislation and policy in the field of prevention of formation of waste and management by them builds the following directions as priorities:

a) prevention;

b) preparation for reutilization;

c) recirculation;

d) other transactions on conversion, including receipt of energy;

e) removal.

(2) Use of the hierarchy of waste specified in part (1), and its observance are obligatory for all subjects involved in waste management which activities consist in ensuring prevention of formation of waste both effective and efficient waste management for the purpose of restriction of their negative effects for the environment.

(3) According to part (2) concerning some specific flows of waste use of hierarchy of waste can undergo changes on the basis of analytical assessment of lifecycle in respect of global effects of formation of such waste and management of them.

(4) the Ministry of the environment provides transparency of process of development of legal acts and policy in the field of waste management according to the Law on transparency of decision making process No. 239-XVI of November 13, 2008.

(5) the Ministry of the environment considers the general principles of environmental protection, precaution and stability, technical justification and economic profitability, protection of resources, and also general impact on the environment, health of the population, economy and society according to provisions of Articles 1 and 4.

(6) Producers of waste, irrespective of form of business (the company, the organization, public organization and organization of welfare appointment) in which subordination more than 10 workers, in addition to the obligations specified in this law develop also implement actions for prevention of formation of waste and apply hierarchy of management of them, including on separate collection of the waste formed in the course of their activities. Are applied to medical institutions of provision of this part irrespective of number of persons employed.

Article 4. Environmental protection and health of the population

When implementing activities for waste management methods and processes which do not pollute the environment are applied and do not threaten health of the population, and competent authorities according to this law control complex of actions for conversion and waste disposal and make efforts they:

a) did not do harm to water resources, atmospheric air, the soil, flora and fauna;

b) did not cause noise pollution or did not extend unpleasant smell;

c) did not make negative impact on landscape or the protected natural territories.

Article 5. Offal

The substances or objects which are accidentally received as a result of the production process which is not connected with their production are not waste as it is determined in Item 9) of Article 2, and are recognized offal if:

a) further use of substance or the corresponding subject is determined;

b) substance or subject can be used directly, without any additional conversion except for provided by customary work practice;

c) production of substance or subject is integral part of production process; and

d) further use is legal, that is substance or subject conforms to all necessary production and ecological requirements and requirements for public health care for specific use and does not cause global effects for the environment or health of the population.

Article 6. Loss of the status of waste

(1) Some types of waste stop being waste as it is determined in Item 9) of Article 2, if transactions on the conversion provided in appendix 2, underwent and correspond to the following criteria:

a) the received substance or subject is used usually in specific purposes;

b) there is market or demand for this substance or subject;

c) substance or subject conforms to technical requirements for achievement of effective objectives and to the regulations applied to products; and

d) use of substance or subject does not do harm to the environment and health of the population.

(2) Specific criteria of loss of the status of waste are established for the purpose of the solution of tasks on conversion and recirculation of certain types of waste, such as nonmetallic inert materials, paper, glass, metals, tires and rags, taking into account potential negative impact on the environment of the corresponding substance or product, including extreme concentration of pollutants.

(3) the Waste which were any more not those according to parts (1) and (2) this Article, also lose the status of waste for the purposes of the conversion and recirculation provided by the regulations approved by the Government if they conform to requirements for conversion or recirculation of certain types of the waste specified in Articles 49-51, 54, 60 and 61.

(4) the Owner of waste sends to the administrative authority given authority on regulation in the field of waste management, specified in part (1) Articles 10, the petition for the termination of the status of waste with observance of provisions of parts (1) – (3) this Article, according to the procedure established by the Government.

Article 7. List of waste

(1) the List of waste, including dangerous, is developed and is regularly updated by the Ministry of the environment and affirms the Government.

(The List of waste allows to determine 2) what waste is dangerous.

(3) Inclusion of substance or subject in the List of waste does not mean that this substance or subject is considered waste in any circumstances. Substances or objects are recognized waste only in case of compliance to the concept given in Item 9) of Article 2.

(4) the Producers and owners of waste who are legal entities irrespective of type of property, form of business and financing source, including bodies of public management in the field of defense, law and order and homeland security, without fail provide compliance of each type of the waste accompanying the activities performed by them, codes of the List of waste according to the regulations approved by the Government.

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