The diagram illustrates the amount of waste which was disposed via landfill, burning and dumping at sea in one European country in the period of 3 years, from 2005 to 2008.
Overall, the amount of waste in landfill experienced a downward trend, but the figure for waste that was burned took the opposite direction. However, the amount of waste dumped at sea stayed stable over the period shown. In addition, while landfill was by far the most popular area to dispose waste, the sea was the lowest during the time surveyed.
In 2005, 1800 million tonnes of waste was stored at landfill, the primary volume of waste, followed by dumping at sea and burning, which was just three times fewer, by 600 and 500 million tonnes, respectively. Nevertheless, just one year later, the amount of waste that was burned and dumped at sea reached the same point.
From 2005 to 2008, the waste quantity which was disposed at landfill saw a dramatic threefold decrease to 600 million tonnes. In contrast, the figure for burning waste climbed gradually to approximately 900 tonnes and became the highest in 2008. Finally, with the volume of waste that dumped into the sea, after not changing in the next three years from 2005, it fell slightly to just around 590 million tonnes in the ending year