Disasters as an opportunity to implement policies on construction and demolition waste management in Brazil - floods of Nova Friburgo (RJ) - 2011

ABSTRACT

Natural disasters often involve work from multiple efforts in both response and resilience phases. One of the challenges that arise on those occasions is recycling the debris - mostly composed of low contamination solid wastes, but offering little commercial interest, due to the difficulties involved in their collection and segregation. This paper aims to show that this task can contribute beneficially to Humanitarian Logistics (HL) in countries that already have regulations in place regarding the management of construction and demolition waste (CDW). The National Solid Waste Policy (Política Nacional de Resíduos Sólidos - PNRS) in Brazil is presented and commented on, as well as the main standards and technologies for CDW treatment, which have existed for two decades, but which have only recently been offered through equipment smaller in size, processing scale, and energy consumption, allowing the treatment of these wastes also in emergency situations. Then it is showed how disasters can help stricken cities to take some advantage to adapt themselves more quickly to regulation, while generating from the waste by-products of higher added value, with potential to be used in the reconstruction effort of both public and private constructions. The event of excessive rains occurred in the city of Nova Friburgo, on January 11^th and 12^th, 2011, was used as a case study. It is concluded that a great opportunity is being wasted, also to reduce post-traumatic stress, by both affected population and those who plan or carry out post-disaster response and resilience actions.

Keywords:
environment; solid waste; construction and demolition waste; humanitarian logistics; Rio de Janeiro; recycling