Whereas the Council resolution of 7 May 19904 on waste policy welcomes and supports the Community strategy document and invites the Commission to propose criteria and standards for the disposal of waste by landfill;

Whereas the Council resolution of 9 December 1996 on waste policy considers that, in the future, only safe and controlled landfill activities should be carried out throughout the Community;

Whereas the prevention, recycling and recovery of waste should be encouraged as should the use of recovered materials and energy so as to safeguard natural resources and obviate wasteful use of land;

Whereas further consideration should be given to the issues of incineration of municipal and non-hazardous waste, composting, biomethanisation, and the processing of dredging sludges;

Whereas under the polluter pays principle it is necessary, inter alia, to take into account any damage to the environment produced by a landfill;

Whereas, like any other type of waste treatment, landfill should be adequately monitored and managed to prevent or reduce potential adverse effects on the environment and risks to human health;

Whereas it is necessary to take appropriate measures to avoid the abandonment, dumping or uncontrolled disposal of waste; whereas, accordingly, it must be possible to monitor landfill sites with respect to the substances contained in the waste deposited there, whereas such substances should, as far as possible, react only in foreseeable ways;

Whereas both the quantity and hazardous nature of waste intended for landfill should be reduced where appropriate; whereas the handling of waste should be facilitated and its recovery enhanced; whereas the use of treatment processes should therefore be encouraged to ensure that landfill is compatible with the objectives of this Directive; whereas sorting is included in the definition of treatment;

Whereas Member States should be able to apply the principles of proximity and self-sufficiency for the elimination of their waste at Community and national level, in accordance with Council Directive 75/442/EEC of 15 July 1975 on waste5 whereas the objectives of this Directive must be pursued and clarified through the establishment of an adequate, integrated network of disposal plants based on a high level of environmental protection;

Whereas disparities between technical standards for the disposal of waste by landfill and the lower costs associated with it might give rise to increased disposal of waste in facilities with low standards of environmental protection and thus create a potentially serious threat to the environment, owing to transport of waste over unnecessarily long distances as well as to inappropriate disposal practices;

Whereas it is therefore necessary to lay down technical standards for the landfill of waste at Community level in order to protect, preserve and improve the quality of the environment in the Community;

Whereas it is necessary to indicate clearly the requirements with which landfill sites must comply as regards location, conditioning, management, control, closure and preventive and protective measures to be taken against any threat to the environment in the short as well as in the long-term perspective, and more especially against the pollution of groundwater by leachate infiltration into the soil;

Whereas in view of the foregoing it is necessary to define clearly the classes of landfill to be considered and the types of waste to be accepted in the various classes of landfill;

Whereas sites for temporary storage of waste should comply with the relevant requirements of Directive 75/442/EEC;

Whereas the recovery, in accordance with Directive 75/442/EEC, of inert or non-hazardous waste which is suitable, through their use in redevelopment/restoration and filling-in work, or for construction purposes may not constitute a landfilling activity;

Whereas measures should be taken to reduce the production of methane gas from landfills, inter alia, in order to reduce global warming, through the reduction of the landfill of biodegradable waste and the requirements to introduce landfill gas control;

Whereas the measures taken to reduce the landfill of biodegradable waste should also aim at encouraging the separate collection of biodegradable waste, sorting in general, recovery and recycling;

Whereeas, because of the particular features of the landfill method of waste disposal, it is necessary to introduce a specific permit procedure for all classes of landfill in accordance with the general licensing requirements already set down in Directive 75/442/EEC and the general requirements of Directive 96/61/EC concerning integrated pollution prevention and control6 whereas the landfill site's compliance with such a permit must be verified in the course of an inspection by the competent authority before the start of disposal operations;

Whereas, in each case, checks should be made to establish whether the waste may be placed in the landfill for which it is intended, in particular as regards hazardous waste;

Whereas, in order to prevent threats to the environment, it is necessary to introduce a uniform waste acceptance procedure on the basis of a classification procedure for waste acceptable in the different categories of landfill, including in particular standardised limit values; whereas to that end a consistent and standardised system of waste characterisation, sampling and analysis must be established in time to facilitate implementation of this Directive; whereas the acceptance criteria must be particularly specific with regard to inert waste;

Whereas, pending the establishment of such methods of analysis or of the limit values necessary for characterisation, Member States may for the purposes of this Directive maintain or draw up national lists of waste which is acceptable or unacceptable for landfill, or define criteria, including limit values, similar to those laid down in this Directive for the uniform acceptance procedure;

Whereas for certain hazardous waste to be accepted in landfills for non-hazardous waste acceptance criteria should be developed by the technical committee;

Whereas it is necessary to establish common monitoring procedures during the operation and after-care phases of a landfill in order to indentify any possible adverse environmental effect of the landfill and take the appropriate corrective measures;

Whereas it is necessary to define when and how a landfill should be closed and the obligations and responsibility of the operator on the site during the after-care period;

Whereas landfill sites that have been closed prior to the date of transposition of this Directive should not be suject to its provisions on closure procedure;

Whereas the future conditions of operation of existing landfills should be regulated in order to take the necessary measures, within a specified period of time, for their adaptation to this Directive on the basis of a site-conditioning plan;

Whereas for operators of existing landfills having, in compliance with binding national rules equivalent to those of Article 14 of this Directive, already submitted the documentation referred to in Article 14(a) of this Directive prior to its entry into force and for which the competent authority authorised the continuation of their operation, there is no need to resubmit this documentation nor for the competent authority to deliver a new authorisation;

Whereas the operator should make adequate provision by way of a financial security or any other equivalent to ensure that all the obligations flowing from the permit are fulfilled, including those relating to the closure procedure and after-care of the site;

Whereas measures should be taken to ensure that the price charged for waste disposal in a landfill cover all the costs involved in the setting up and operation of the facility, including as far as possible the financial security or its equivalent which the site operator must provide, and the estimated cost of closing the site including the necessary after-care;

Whereas, when a competent authority considers that a landfill is unlikely to cause a hazard to the environment for longer than a certain period, the estimated costs to be included in the price to be charged by an operator may be limited to that period;

Whereas it is necessary to ensure the proper application of the provisions implementing this Directive throughout the Community, and to ensure that the training and knowledge acquired by landfill operators and staff afford them the necessary skills;

Whereas the Commission must establish a standard procedure for the acceptance of waste and set up a standard classification of waste acceptable in a landfill in accordance with the committee procedure laid down in Article 18 of Directive 75/442/EEC;

Whereas adaptation of the Annexes to this Directive to scientific and technical progress and the standardisation of the monitoring, sampling and analysis methods must be adopted under the same committee procedure;

Whereas the Member States must send regular reports to the Commission on the implementation of this Directive paying particular attention to the national strategies to be set up in pursuance of Article 5; whereas on the basis of these reports the Commission shall report to the European Parliament and the Council;