Waste fees enable functional waste management
Well-functioning waste management prevents littering in the environment and promotes the return of materials to circulation. Waste management is used to collect, transport and treat waste appropriately, so that it does not cause harm to the environment, people or animals.
"Many people are surprised to learn that municipal waste management is not financed by tax money at all. According to the Waste Act, the costs must only be covered by waste fees," says Saana Lempiäinen, Chief Waste Management Planner at the Jyväskylä Region Waste Board.
Waste fees must correspond to the costs of waste management and take into account the level of service. In other words, waste fees must be collected in sufficient quantities to finance the waste management costs of municipal residents.
Information on the waste fees collected in the Jyväskylä region and their uses is published annually on the website of the waste management authority. You can find the waste fee accrual for 2025 here (in Finnish).
What do waste fees consist of?
The waste fees consist of the basic fee and the fees for emptying the waste containers. The basic fee is used to cover costs that cannot be allocated to certain customers on the basis of the basic principle of waste management, "the polluter pays". Such costs include, for example, the costs of the treatment of hazardous waste and end-of-life textiles, the maintenance of waste stations, waste advice and the activities of the waste management authority. The basic fee is the same for all properties in the same property group located in the Jyväskylä, Muurame, Laukaa and Toivakka areas.
Hazardous waste, such as pharmaceutical waste, paints, oils and car batteries, is environmentally harmful waste. For this reason, households can recycle them free of charge.
"The free reception lowers the threshold for bringing hazardous waste to the right place and prevents it from ending up in nature," Lempiäinen says.
Even if a household does not produce environmentally harmful waste itself, it still benefits from the fact that the environment remains clean when hazardous waste from other households is properly treated. The basic fee is also used to maintain a waste reception and collection network so that services are available when recyclable waste is generated by households.
The fees for emptying waste containers are used to cover the costs of collecting, transporting, processing and utilising waste. The emptying fees are determined by the size of the waste container on the property and how often it is emptied. The 'polluter pays' principle can therefore be applied quite directly to these charges.
"The more often the waste container is emptied and the larger the waste container, the more costs it incurs," Lempiäinen explains.
How can I influence the amount of my waste fee bill?
In other words, you cannot influence the amount of your own basic fee. However, you can influence the fees for emptying waste containers by considering waste management choices in your everyday life.
"The easiest way to save on waste fees is to recycle as much as possible. When biowaste and other useful fractions are sorted separately, significantly less mixed waste is generated. The fees for emptying the mixed waste container are the most expensive of the different waste fractions," says Lempiäinen.
For example, you can save on the costs of emptying a biowaste container in the long term by investing in your own thermally insulated composter.
If the mixed waste container is not filled by the next emptying, you can order an emptying interval of 2 or 4 weeks for the mixed waste container with your own notification or apply for an emptying interval of 8 or 12 weeks with a separate application from the waste management authority. The less often the waste container is emptied, the lower the waste fees will be.
The amount of mixed waste on many properties has dropped significantly in recent years thanks to diligent recycling. The waste management regulations will be updated during 2027, when the emptying intervals of waste containers will be reviewed. The aim is that more and more properties could have a longer emptying interval for their mixed waste containers if recycling generates only a small amount of mixed waste.
"Efficient recycling benefits both the environment and your own wallet," Lempiäinen points out.
This article is part of a series of articles based on the responses to the City of Jyväskylä's waste management resident survey. The series discusses the waste management themes that emerged in the survey, and the residents wished for more information about them.