Off-Base Recycling

Contact Information

Community Recycling Liaison:
Giovanna Coppola, 31 CES/CEI

Phone:
DSN: 632.2511 | Commercial: 0434.30.2511

Welcome to Italy!

Italy is a wonderful place to call home. It’s family friendly, welcoming, has beautiful scenery, amazing food and wine, and lots of local activities. However, some aspects of Italian life can be complicated or confusing. In particular, Italy’s recycling laws tend to be quite different from the US.

To assist U.S. service members in complying with local Recycling Requirements, Aviano AB has established a Community Recycling Liaison who is available to answer any questions.

In Italy, recycling is required by law and not complying may result in fines, or even a legal violation. Fines range from €50.00 – €750.00, and workers can (and do) check recycling periodically to ensure compliance.

Every community in the local area has an ecological platform (i.e. a community dump). Each platform’s rules vary, but they exist to help dispose of bulk items in an incremental and systematic manner. For more information, check out our packets below and reach out to the Community Recycling Liaison.

Ecological Platforms

If you have large items that don’t fit or can’t go out with your normal recycling or dry waste bins – for instance, an area rug that’s lived its life and needs replacing – you may be wondering how you can dispose of them. This is where your community’s Ecological Platform comes to the rescue!

If you’ve never used the ecological platform, are unsure where it is, how it works, or are worried about a language barrier – don’t worry! Simply contact the Aviano AB Community Recycling Liaison, Giovanna Coppola, and she will walk you through it. She will even accompany you on your first visit, if you’d like!

Procedures of Acccess for Ecological Platforms

GEA Only: Tenants/users must have a magnetic card issued by GEA in order to be authorized access to the waste collection center/ecological platform. Operators will scan the card each time waste is brought to the platform. For American tenants/users, GEA will issue this card ONLY to the landlords/owners of the property (free of charge the first time), who in turn should deliver the card to their tenants. If a tenant loses a card, he/she must request a replacement and pay a 5 euro fee.

The magnetic strip in the card indicates a specific property and its owner, and it is considered a valid form of identification – so be careful not to lose it! The card will need to be returned to the landlord upon the termination of the tenant’s lease.

Ambiente Servizi, ASVO & SAVNO: Tenants need to show the operator their ID card and a copy of their lease contract (only the first page, as this contains all the info the operator needs to verify residence).

PCS Recycling

We know PCSing is stressful, and often results in the need to dispose of bulky items and excess amounts of “stuff” as you purge for your move. While this can pose some challenges, planning ahead is the best way to ensure you are able to get rid of these items legally, and without having to pay for special removal by your community’s refuse contractor. Give our Community Recycling Liaison a quick call, and she will set you up for success!

Did You Know?

Now that you’ve learned all about how recycling programs and laws work in Italy, you may be wondering why we don’t seem to recycle very well in places like the Food Court or at other food services around base.

The answer is actually quite simple: it’s on purpose! “Contaminated waste”, such as paper with ketchup on it, will ruin an entire bin of properly-sorted, recyclable materials. For this reason, food service areas pose a particular risk to other recycling efforts, as customers don’t have access to things they would at home to ensure materials are properly cleaned. Therefore, at this time (and for the foreseeable future), clean plastic is the only thing we can recycle in our food service areas.