Where does our waste actually go?

The short answer is it depends on what waste you’re referring to, so let’s break that down below.

In Europe, approximately 5 tonnes of waste is produced per person per year (2.23B tonnes in total).

64% is mining waste, old concrete and removed soil. Heavy, inert, and largely recoverable.

Strip this out and what remains is 1.8 tonnes of waste per person.

Of that, 517 kg is municipal waste, so in the bins you and I interact with daily. The rest is a mix of industrial, commercial, agricultural and other waste.

Tracked waste streams

Per person, per year, and what returns:

• 178 kg packaging · 67.5% recycled

• 517 kg municipal · 48.1% recycled

• 35 kg plastic packaging · 42.1% recycled

• 129 kg food & bio-waste · ~40% recycled

• 11.6 kg e-waste collected, of 32 kg sold · 30.8% recycled

• 16 kg textiles · <1% fibre-to-fibre; <15% collected separately

(These overlap: packaging, food and textiles also partly sit inside the municipal value.)

Packaging works best due to systems such as deposit schemes, producer responsibility and collection infrastructure.

Textiles have none of that. 85% of textile waste passes through municipal bins, so it is not collected separately, and from there it is lost to landfill or incineration.

Where Greece sits

• We recycle 17% (vs. EU avg. 49%)

• We landfill 80% (vs. EU avg. 24%)

Neither stat has improved since 2019.

Photo: Gwendolyn Schanker

On 9 October 2025 the Court of Justice fined Greece €5.5M over one landfill on Zakynthos, inside protected loggerhead habitat, plus €12,500 for every further day it stays open. The court listed Greece’s national waste record as an aggravating factor. A landfill restoration plan has been made, but has there been any progress?

By 2035 every member state must recycle 65% and landfill under 10%.

Over the coming weeks we take this apart: what is being done, the gaps, who solved it elsewhere, and who is building the fix.

Comment any reflections and insights on LinkedIn or Facebook.

Sources

• Eurostat – Waste statistics (2022 data): total EU waste generation and mineral share

• Eurostat – Municipal waste statistics: generation, recycling and landfill rates

• Eurostat – 517 kg of municipal waste per capita in 2024

• Eurostat – Packaging waste statistics (2023): packaging and plastic packaging volumes and recycling

• Eurostat – Food waste in the EU: 129 kg per person in 2024

• Eurostat – Waste statistics, electrical and electronic equipment (2023): equipment placed on the market and WEEE collected

• European Environment Agency – Recycling rates in Europe by waste stream (2023): packaging, municipal and e-waste recycling rates

• European Environment Agency – Circularity of the EU textiles value chain in numbers (2022 data): textile generation and capture rate

• European Compost Network – Bio-waste in Europe (2022): bio-waste recycling share (industry association estimate)

• McKinsey & Company – Scaling textile recycling in Europe: fibre-to-fibre recycling share (industry estimate)

• European Environment Agency – Greece circular economy country profile (2022 data): Greek recycling and landfill rates

• Court of Justice of the European Union – judgment of 9 October 2025 on the Zakynthos landfill (Case C-368/24, following Case C-600/12)

• European Commission – Waste Framework Directive: 2035 recycling target

• European Commission – Landfill Directive: 2035 landfill target