Collection: An action aimed at gathering solid waste in a specific and appropriate place for its collection, treatment, or final disposal.
Temporary storage: The deposit of solid waste or discards for a short period, in containers prior to collection, treatment, or final disposal.
Recovery: A set of actions whose purpose is to maintain the materials that constitute them in economic or commercial cycles, through their reuse, remanufacturing, redesign, reprocessing, recycling, and recovery of secondary materials, thereby not losing their economic value.
Community collection center: A community facility, with the necessary equipment, for the storage of recoverable solid waste generated by residents, prior to segregated collection by the respective vehicles for transport to a material recovery center.
Material recovery center: A permanent site for the reception and temporary storage of waste for recovery, where recoverable materials can be weighed, classified, separated, and prepared according to their nature (e.g. plastic, cardboard, paper, glass, and metals) for subsequent commercialization.
Classification: The activity of sorting waste materials by type and characteristics for subsequent recovery.
Container: A receptacle intended for the temporary deposit of solid waste.
Composting: A technique that allows the decomposition of biodegradable organic matter in a controlled manner to achieve a product usable as a soil amendment.
Discard: Material that, once used or for any other reason, is not functional for the person who acquired it.
Final disposal: The action of permanently depositing or confining solid waste in sites or facilities whose characteristics are those of a site designed for this purpose.
Generation Source: The place where waste is generated.
Generator: An individual or legal entity, public or private, that uses the municipal service for collection, treatment, and final disposal of the solid waste it produces.
Integral Waste Management: An articulated and interrelated set of regulatory, operational, financial, administrative, educational, planning, monitoring, and evaluation actions for waste handling, from its generation to final disposal.
Municipalidad: For the purposes of this Regulation, whenever indicated, Municipalidad shall be understood as the Municipalidad of Sarapiquí.
Municipal Plan for Integral Solid Waste Management (Plan Municipal de Gestión Integral de Residuos Sólidos, PMGIRS): An instrument that defines the cantonal policy on the matter and will guide municipal and/or cantonal actions on the subject within the area of its competence. It is the result of a planning process that is preferably prepared in a participatory manner by the municipality, incorporating the diverse actors of the canton.
Collection: The activity carried out to gather recyclable materials in containers for subsequent transport to a plant where their recovery is performed.
Separation: Forming homogeneous groups of elements that were mixed with others.
Recycling: Subjecting a used material to a process so that it can be used again, such as subjecting a material repeatedly to the same cycle, to extend or increase its effects.
Segregated collection: A separate collection service for solid waste previously classified at the generation source according to the type of material, allowing it to be recovered.
Reduction: An activity that allows a person to decrease the amount of solid waste generated or disposed of.
Waste: Solid, gaseous, or liquid material contained in a container or receptacle, which its generator or possessor wishes or must dispose of, and which may or must be recovered or treated responsibly.
Ordinary solid waste: Household waste generated in dwellings and any other source whose characteristics ensure it is not a direct source of danger to health or the environment. Wastes requiring special or hazardous handling, such as those which are the product of industrial activity and those from medical and pharmaceutical activity, are excluded.
Organic waste. Easily biodegradable solid or semi-solid waste, of animal or vegetable origin, which can be decomposed and recovered through composting.
Hazardous waste: That which due to its corrosive, explosive, radioactive, toxic, infectious, biological, flammable, combustible, sharp, or a combination thereof characteristics may cause damage to human health and the environment. The following shall be considered as hazardous waste originating in residential units, among others: expired medicines, glass thermometers, fluorescent lamps, light fixtures, batteries, flammable substances (paint and solvent residues), used oils, electronic equipment, and injection needles or other sharp objects.
Recoverable solid waste: Waste that has reuse value or has the potential to be recovered through recycling or composting processes.
Bulky or non-traditional solid waste: Those objects disposed of by their owners sporadically, having reached the end of their useful life, which due to their size, weight, or characteristics are not suitable for ordinary collection and require a special collection service; such as refrigerators, water heaters, stoves, mattresses, washing machines, or any furniture of similar characteristics.
Construction and demolition waste: that solid waste generated in tasks such as: the construction, reconstruction, repair, alteration, expansion, and demolition of buildings, and urbanization works of any nature, whether urban or rural.
Special handling waste: That ordinary waste which, due to its volume, quantity, potential risks, transportation needs, storage conditions, or recovery value, needs to be removed from the normal stream of ordinary waste.
Sanitary Landfill: An engineering method for the final disposal of solid waste generated in the canton, in accordance with the Sanitary Landfill Regulation.
Waste separation: A procedure by which solid waste is prevented from being mixed at the generation source, allowing it to be disposed of in a classified and separate manner, for collection purposes.
Treatment: The transformation of waste or specific parts into new products, or the change of characteristics, such as recycling, composting, mechanical biological treatment, thermal treatment, among others.
User: For the purposes of the provision of the services regulated herein, any individual and legal entity who is affected or benefited by the integral waste management (Gestión Integral de Residuos Sólidos, GIRS) services has the category of user.
Recovery: A set of associated actions whose objective is to give added value to waste for production processes through material recovery and/or energy recovery and the rational use of resources.