From landfill to water, land and life: The creation of the Centre for stone materials aimed at secondary processing Nicola Careddu a,n,1 , Giampaolo Siotto a , Riccardo Siotto b , Caterina Tilocca a a Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture Department (DICAAR), University of Cagliari, Italy b Mediterranea Progetti e Finanza s.r.l., Cagliari, Italy article info Article history: Received 5 February 2013 Received in revised form 8 April 2013 Accepted 2 May 2013 Available online 12 July 2013 JEL classification: Q01 Q32 Keywords: Limestone Dimension stone Secondary raw materials Logistic abstract This paper focuses on the creation of a Centre for the recycling of stone materials. The Centre will be able to offer a range of activities amongst which is the improvement of the production chain of the Orosei Marble district in Sardinia, Italy. Several companies operate within the marble producing area, specializing in both quarrying and stone processing. They have formed a Consortium in order to rehabilitate an area of more than 17 ha. The restoration will be carried out through an environmentally sustainable procedure. The area was previously used as a landfill for waste deriving from marble quarrying and processing. At that time unshaped blocks of various sizes (which are unsuitable to block- cutter sawing), waste deriving from both block sawing and slab/strip cutting (such as broken slabs, strips, tiles) and microfine dust from filter presses of water treatment plants were representing an environ- mental problem. The local administration was struggling to find new areas which could be used for landfills, resulting in an additional cost for the landfill, ultimately affecting the variable production costs. The project involves the building of a venue to be used for temporary storage, treatment of wastes produced by both quarrying and primary processing, in order to make them suitable as secondary raw materials. The project also deals with the catch basin hydrology of the area involved in the project, the building of a multifunctional centre, the landscaping and other environmental features such as vehicle traffic and slopes greening. & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Introduction The environment, safety and economy of the entire Orosei Marble producing area have been carefully examined and studied in the last 30 years as well as its features, possible usage and the impacts generated by both operating quarries and stone proces- sing plants (Careddu and Siotto, 2011). The examined area covers a surface of about 200 ha and is located at the foot of Monte Tuttavista (Eastern Sardinia) as shown in Figs. 1 and 2. More specifically, the outlying areas around the town of Orosei where quarries and stone processing plants are located, is classified in the current general town-planning scheme as Industrial Zone “D” (Siotto, 2006). The quarries provide local employment opportunities that support the town's economy. Fifteen quarries and 15 stone processing plants currently operate in the area, employing almost 500 workers (and over a 1000 more if we consider the related activities), over 16% of industry employees (Siotto et al., 2010). Over the last few years its total annual revenue amounted to more than 100 million Euros, and the related activities are estimated to generate at least three times as much. Monte Tuttavista is composed of Mesozoic limestone and dolostones layers of Jurassic to Cretaceous age. From a lithological standpoint, the term “marble” is really an inaccurate name. Unlike true marble, the “Orosei Marble” is actually an unmetamorphosed sedimentary rock which is classified as a polishable limestone in the stone market. The fossils contained in it are visible to the naked eye. In over 40 years the intense quarrying, followed by processing of blocks in semi-finished and finished products, resulted in a remarkable production of wastes/scrapes, currently inconveni- ently stored at a consortium landfill. Fig. 3a and b shows that marble waste and also tyres, tanks or other spare parts of plants and machines were all disposed at the landfill. Moreover, the Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/resourpol Resources Policy 0301-4207/$ - see front matter & 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.resourpol.2013.05.001 n Corresponding author. Present address: Civil and Environmental Engineering and Architecture Department (DICAAR), University of Cagliari, Via Marengo, 3. 09123 Cagliari, Italy. Tel: +39 070 675 5561; fax: +39 070 675 5523. E-mail addresses: ncareddu@unica.it (N. Careddu), studio.siotto@gmail.com (G. Siotto), mpfsrl@gmail.com (R. Siotto), tilocca@unica.it (C. Tilocca). 1 He worked both in research and development of diamond technologies for stone processing, and creation of the Consortium of Orosei Marble and Granite. He is currently Researcher in “Surface Mining and Quarrying” at the University of Cagliari (Italy). His actual research interests are: mining plants, advanced technol- ogies for dimension stones quarrying and processing, recovery and utilization of stone waste/scrap, and environmental rehabilitation. Resources Policy 38 (2013) 258–265