Today, Ukraine is among the top ten countries in the world in terms of the amount of solid waste generated. Such data is provided by the American agency 24/7 Wall Street. The State Statistical Service of Ukraine estimates that Ukrainians throw away up to 500 million tons of garbage every year. Of these, most (76%) are formed from primary production, that is, resources taken from the environment, from secondary production (recycling waste) — about 18%, from agriculture — about 2%, and another 2% falls on household waste, which annually accumulates in an amount of about 12 million tons.

Since February 24, 2022, the situation has become even more complicated. With the start of a full-scale Russian war on the territory of Ukraine, a new, even more dangerous type was added to the usual categories of garbage (plastic, glass, paper, food waste) — war waste.

Destroyed buildings and structures, fragments of shells and rockets, toxic gases from explosions, burned vehicles and military equipment — all this is war waste in Ukraine, which, according to experts, has already reached such proportions that have not been seen on the European continent since the Second World War. This waste pollutes the territory of the country, poisoning the air, ground and surface waters and affects the climate.

According to the information of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine, published in November at the 27th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Sharm el-Sheikh, there was about 15.2 billion tons of waste generated from the destruction of buildings and structures only in the de-occupied territories of Kiev, Chernihiv and Sumy regions. As a result of full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation In Ukraine, more than 200,000 cars and trucks have been destroyed, which are stored in specially designated areas.

War sweeps away everything in its path, sowing destruction and death. It causes enormous damage to nature.

Just imagine: artillery and rocket attacks destroy the soil and vegetation cover. Remains of destroyed military equipment and fuels and lubricants pollute the earth. Fires at infrastructure facilities and areas of natural ecosystems caused by ammunition explosions make the air toxic. Animals and plants are dying, landscapes are changing, surface and ground waters are being poisoned. Mined areas pose a danger to the life of both people and animals.

The State Ecological Inspectorate of Ukraine, as of October 27, 2022, after 8 months of a full-scale invasion by Russia, assessed the environmental damage as follows:

According to Ukrainian environmentalists, hundreds of thousands or even millions of wild animals and more than 6 million pets have died because of the Russian invasion.

Damage to ecosystems does not recognize borders, which means that other European countries will also feel the negative consequences of the destruction of the natural balance in Ukraine. According to the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, 2.5 million hectares of Europe's nature protection network are under threat of destruction today from Russia's actions. These are 160 sites of the Emerald Network — habitats of species protected at the European level.

When structures are damaged, pollutant emissions pose the greatest threat. Especially a lot of them are formed during the detonation of rockets: oxide and carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, oxides of metals (aluminum, iron, etc.), gaseous and solid products of incomplete oxidation of the explosive are released. It all depends on the chemical composition and oxygen balance. In the presence of precipitation, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen compounds are mixed with water and oxygen, with the subsequent formation of sulfuric and nitric acids — and now we are dealing with acid rain.

The threat to the environment, Nadezhda Groza continues, is also posed by leaks of specific substances that are used, manufactured, and stored at the facility. Their pollution of soil and water bodies is not limited to local influence: they infect aquifers in very remote areas.

At the time of an emergency, meteorological factors are very important: the presence of precipitation, wind speed and direction. They predetermine the conditions for the dispersion and movement of toxic substances.

The explosion also releases greenhouse gases such as carbon monoxide and water vapor into the air. And they directly affect climate change. Given that our planet has a single ecosystem, the negative effects will be felt on a global level.

The use of weapons is an integral part of military operations. Ammunition, rocket fragments, abandoned equipment, contain metals. For example, the shells and components of missiles are mainly made of stainless steel, aluminum, lead, magnesium or titanium alloys. The composition of the explosive itself contains heavy metals, fuel, solvents, energy materials (RDX, TNT, etc.) and oxidizing agents (such as perchlorate), which can pollute both the soil and groundwater.

Most heavy metals, as Nadezhda Groza explains, do not undergo biological or chemical decay when they enter the soil. This poses a danger to humans and ecosystems due to: actual ingestion of contaminated soil or contact with it, transmission through the food chain (soil-plant-human or soil-plant-animal-human), drinking poisoned groundwater, reducing food quality (their safety and presentation) due to phytotoxicity, unsuitability of land for agricultural use. Heavy metals can accumulate in cells, causing pathological processes in them.

According to the estimates of the Ukrainian Environmental Group, as a result of shelling, 50 tons of iron, 1 ton of sulfur compounds and 2.35 tons of copper fell into the ground per 1 square kilometer of a field in the Kharkiv region — and these are only the substances found in the largest quantities.

So now the question is what to do in such a situation.

Even before the full-scale war, construction debris occupied a significant part of the landfills. There is usually a lot after the reconstruction or construction of facilities.

In April 2022, the Ministry of Regional Development, together with the Ministry of Environmental Protection, began to develop mechanisms for the disposal and reuse of construction waste generated as a result of infrastructure destruction.

Such waste can be used not only in the restoration of damaged objects, but also in the production of building materials. Waste unsuitable for processing (recycling) and use as secondary raw material is subject to storage and further environmentally safe disposal.

In the early days of the full-scale Russian military invasion of the territory of Ukraine, an operational headquarters began to work under the State Environmental Inspectorate to record, streamline information and form a unified register of damage caused to the environment. The purpose of the working group is to create a complete list of violations in the region and bring the aggressor to justice.

The headquarters included specialists from the State Environmental Inspectorate, representatives of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Committee on Environmental Policy and Nature Management, the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, the Security Service of Ukraine, the prosecutor's office, territorial bodies for ecology and natural resources and the State Forestry Agency.

On September 20, 2022 he headquarters developed and approved the Decree of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine on the establishment of a Special Monitoring Mission in the country. It was sent to the UN General Assembly, the European Commission, the European Parliament, the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and other international organizations, and there is already some progress: in a resolution of November 14, 2022, the UN General Assembly called for taking into account environmental damage along with other types of losses, for example, infrastructural damage.

In addition, the headquarters has developed methods for calculating inorganic emissions of pollutants into the atmosphere in case of emergencies and/or during martial law, a method for calculating the amount of damage to soils due to emergencies and/or during martial law, as well as a method for calculating the damage caused by water pollution or spontaneous use of water resources.

Ecothreat resource also fixes the environmental crimes of the war. There, the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine collects information on the impact of hostilities on the ecological situation, on damage estimates carried out by the State Environmental Inspectorate in accordance with approved methods, data on the level of radiation, air quality in individual regions, etc. Based on this information, a plan for the subsequent elimination of environmental consequences is developed. You can report all environmental crimes in Ukraine as a result of military confrontation in the SaveEcoBot chat bot.

Ukraine has developed the necessary legal acts for the effective management of war waste. So, on September 27, 2022, the Cabinet of Ministers signed the Decree “On approval of the procedure for handling waste generated in connection with damage (destruction) of buildings and structures as a result of hostilities, terrorist acts, sabotage or work to eliminate their consequences, and making changes to some resolutions of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine”. According to the document, a set of organizational and technical measures and works (operations) is provided to ensure the environmentally safe collection, transportation, sorting, storage, processing (recycling), disposal, removal, neutralization and disposal of such waste.

Construction debris, ecologists say, can be used not only in the restoration of damaged objects, but also in the production of building materials.

The process of waste disposal begins with sorting. Metal-plastic and glass, materials for facade and interior decoration, reinforcing mesh, mineral wool, wall coverings, roofing, household items and wood fragments — these categories can be used separately. However, since they are mixed in the rubble, very careful sorting is required.

Then, the groups of materials suitable for reuse (glass, metal, plastic, concrete) and not recyclable, requiring disposal are determined, for example, thermally deformed facade insulation elements.

The next stage of waste processing is the reduction of its volume. In Kharkiv, for example, a special shredder is used, which reduces mountains of garbage by 5-8 times, depending on the materials of the building. The unit turns concrete slabs into rubble, and a magnetic separator allows you to select metal reinforcement. Only one worker is needed to manage such a complex, so time and labor costs are significantly reduced.

The third stage includes the return of the collected materials to civil circulation for using as secondary raw materials:

Waste from destruction can be used in the manufacture of low-grade concrete. There are corresponding plants in Ukraine, and if their capacities are not enough, European partners are ready to provide assistance. Institute GP “NIISK” is the representative of Ukraine in the International Federation of Structural Concrete, its employees have already posted an appeal, where they talk about the European experience in the use of concrete from construction waste.

In addition, recycled construction waste, according to the UN Environment Programme, can replace sand, the stocks of which are declining in the world. Ore sand is a by-product of mineral processing intended for construction and industry.

Other examples of the use of construction waste: crushed stone is made from concrete, which is then used to cover foundation pits. Asphalt can be reused in road construction (this requires heat treatment). Armature also takes on a second life during the construction of buildings.

On June 20, 2022, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted the draft law "On Waste Management" in the second reading, which actually launched the waste management reform.

Before the war, 34 waste sorting lines operated in 29 settlements of Ukraine, and waste processing complexes were built in 11 of them. In March 2022, another such plant was to be opened in Zhytomyr. However, the full-scale Russian invasion disturbed these plans. The plant was put into operation only in February 2023. In addition, in the pre-war period, separate collection of household waste was carried out in 1725 cities and towns of the country. In Lviv, for example, an organic waste composting station appeared in 2020. It worked like this: a car cruised around the city and collected this type of waste. At the station, it was turned into compost, which was sold, and the resulting mixture was used to plant greenery in the city.

As long as the war goes on, the statistics of environmental damage will only get worse. Unfortunately, a big mission has been entrusted to Ukraine — to supplement international law with the concept of “ecocide” and to hold Russia accountable for crimes against the Ukrainian people and the environment. Work in this direction is already underway. As well as what concerns the post-war renewal of Ukraine. In July 2022, President Volodymyr Zelensky announced the National Recovery Plan for the country.

Despite the current situation, we will rebuild Ukraine on the principles of sustainable development and the European Green Deal. Dozens of public organizations of Ukraine, business, the Ukrainian government and international partners are already working for this result.