a b s t r a c t
The composition of household waste in Greenland was investigated for the first time. About 2 tonnes of
household waste was sampled as every 7th bag collected during 1 week along the scheduled collection
routes in Sisimiut, the second largest town in Greenland with about 5400 inhabitants. The collection bags
were sorted manually into 10 material fractions. The household waste composition consisted primarily of
biowaste (43%) and the combustible fraction (30%), including anything combustible that did not belong to
other clean fractions as paper, cardboard and plastic. Paper (8%) (dominated by magazine type paper) and
glass (7%) were other important material fractions of the household waste. The remaining approximately
10% constituted of steel (1.5%), aluminum (0.5%), plastic (2.4%), wood (1.0%), non-combustible waste
(1.8%) and household hazardous waste (1.2%). The high content of biowaste and the low content of paper
make Greenlandic waste much different from Danish household waste. The moisture content, calorific
value and chemical composition (55 elements, of which 22 were below detection limits) were determined
for each material fraction. These characteristics were similar to what has been found for material
fractions in Danish household waste. The chemical composition and the calorific value of the plastic fraction
revealed that this fraction was not clean but contained a lot of biowaste. The established waste composition
is useful in assessing alternative waste management schemes for household waste in Greenland.