What is Zero Waste? The regulation, the certificate and the link to LCA

Zero Waste is a management approach aiming to prevent waste before it arises, collect it separately at source and recover it at the highest possible value. In Turkey the concept began as an awareness campaign but became a binding obligation for defined organisations through the Zero Waste Regulation.

Who it covers

The regulation makes the system mandatory for public institutions, workplaces above a defined size, shopping centres, education and healthcare establishments, hotels and facilities in organised industrial zones. A covered organisation must set up separate collection at source, train staff and report waste data into the national system.

The waste hierarchy

The logic behind Zero Waste is the same hierarchy as in the EU Waste Framework Directive, and the order matters — recycling is not at the top of the list.

• Prevention — waste never arising; the highest-value intervention
• Preparing for reuse — restoring a product so it can be used again as it is
• Recycling — recovering the material as input to new production
• Other recovery — including energy recovery
• Disposal — landfill; a last resort only

Certificate tiers

Organisations that implement the system can obtain a Zero Waste Certificate. It is tiered, rising from a basic level through silver, gold and platinum. The tier is set by separate collection rates, staff training, monitoring records and improvement performance. It is increasingly asked for in tenders and corporate supplier assessments.

The link to LCA

Implementing Zero Waste produces a valuable data source for an LCA: waste types, quantities and destinations are now on record. That data is used directly in two places — production-stage waste flows and end-of-life scenarios.

But there is a difference, and it matters. Zero Waste manages waste at the site boundary; an LCA accounts for waste across the product’s whole life cycle — mining waste at extraction, scrap at a supplier’s plant, the product’s end-of-life at the consumer. A site with a high Zero Waste tier may still not know its product’s total waste footprint.