site.btaSofia Mayor Expects Solution within Week for Separate Waste Collection in 14 Sofia Boroughs after Ecobulpak Fire

A solution should be found within a week for servicing the separate waste collection containers in 14 Sofia boroughs following last Wednesday's fire at Ecobulpak's facility, Sofia Mayor Vassil Terziev said in a Facebook post on Thursday. He said that the fire confronted Sofia with an unexpected and very complex problem.

On July 1, a fire broke out at a waste treatment facility operated by Ecobulpak in Sofia. Firefighters found two plastic recycling warehouses ablaze. Six fire engines with firefighting crews, a hazardous materials unit and an ambulance were dispatched to the scene. The fire spread across an area of about 2,000 square metres, Sofia Directorate for Fire Safety and Civil Protection head Veselin Getov told reporters.

"In the first hours and days after the fire, safety was our main priority. We mobilized all resources and worked side by side with the fire service, State institutions and all teams involved to bring the situation under control and prevent further damage. The situation was extremely complicated, but fortunately we managed to cope," the Mayor wrote.

He said that in recent days the municipality had held several talks with the operator, and a meeting with the owners took place on Wednesday. 

Terziev recalled that Ecobulpak services the colour-coded containers in 14 of Sofia's 24 districts: Nadezhda, Serdika, Krasna Polyana, Ilinden, Vazrazhdane, Vitosha, Lozenets, Izgrev, Slatina, Lyulin, Poduyane, Vrabnitsa, Pancharevo and Bankya. The fire affected the very facility through which handles part of the separately collected waste. "This has created serious difficulties in servicing the containers, not because of a lack of willingness, but because of a real and objective capacity problem following the incident," the Mayor commented.

He called for proper sorting of packaging waste and for plastic bottles, cans and cardboard boxes to be crushed so that they take up less space. Terziev asked citizens to keep some of their packaging waste at home for a few more days or to use colour-coded containers in districts serviced by another operator, where collection schedules have not been disrupted. These districts are Sredets, Krasno Selo, Oborishte, Triaditsa, Iskar, Mladost, Studentski, Ovcha Kupel, Novi Iskar and Kremikovtsi.

In a separate development, Municipal Councillor Vanya Grigorova of the Bulgarian Socialist Party said on Thursday that waste is being illegally buried at the Sofia Waste Treatment Enterprise, causing landfills to fill up extremely quickly, while the enterprise is concealing the practice and failing to pay the fees due to the State. She was speaking to reporters ahead of a Sofia Municipal Council meeting.

The enterprise's director, Nikolay Savov, was heard on Tuesday by the Sofia Municipal Council's environment committee. Grigorova said that she, Plamena Terziradeva of Save Sofia and GERB municipal councillor Anton Hekimyan had sent a letter with questions over a series of videos and photos received from employees of the plant, which they said showed serious violations. She showed photos which, according to her, showed waste bunkers overflowing, with waste being dumped in front of them rather than inside them. Grigorova said that a front loader was loading waste onto another truck, which then transported it directly to the landfill for burial.