Reverse logistics - Essay Example

(Mills, 2007, p. 21). Together with an increase in consumption comes an increase in material waste. Factory overruns, defective goods, and simply goods that have reached the end of their useful lives, will naturally be expected to accumulate. Given the volumes of waste generated by the mass of population making use of these products, the situation presents itself as a logistical predicament worthy of planning of the highest priority. According to the old methods of waste disposal, municipal solid waste (MSW) is traditionally incinerated in Europe because it is self-combusting.

The first dedicated waste incinerators are more than a century old, having been build in 1876 in Great Britain. It was intended to eliminate waste in order to avoid the deleterious effects of rotting organic matter. While technological advances have greatly improved this method of waste disposal today, it is less prioritized in the hierarchy of methods articulated in the European waste management strategy when compared to prevention and material recycling. Among disposal systems, landfilling is the much more preferred option rather than incineration.

70% of MSW is relegated to landfills, while less than 20% is incinerated. Even then, landfilling is increasingly becoming a less viable option, because of decreasing availability of land, dangers of groundwater contamination, aesthetic and public health issues. (Bontoux, 1999) The problem is not limited to Europe alone. In the United States, for instance, MSW generation has engendered problems in landfilling that threatens to quickly overtake capacities for accommodating the volumes created.

In a study conducted by the Earth Sciences Division, under the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and sponsored by the US Department of Energy, it was determined that as much as 214,000,000 tons of municipal solid waste is generated every year. According to data gathered