Environment Minister Sergio Costa was present in Caserta when the city’s first full size artificial turf pitch was opened for use. He said, “Here in Caserta, we probably have the first regulation field of synthetic grass football field completed thanks to end of use tyres, that if not collected, we could have found them in flames on the street. This is the circular economy that we like”.
Italian City of Caserta Lays an Artificial, Granulate Filled Pitch
This was said, at the so-called “Vanvitelli district”, at the inauguration ceremony of the two football and five-a-side fields, created by Ecopneus, a consortium responsible for managing the ELT.
The work was prescribed by a protocol signed in June 2013 by Ecopneus with the Ministry of the Environment, the prefectures of Naples and Caserta and the Minister of the Interior responsible for combating the phenomenon of waste fires in the Campania region; a protocol that has already enabled sports facilities to be built in degraded areas of the Neapolitan area, such as in Scampia and the Parco Verde in Caivano.
“In total – explains Costa – in dozens of Municipalities between Naples and Caserta in the “Land of Fires”, 22 thousand tons of ELT have been collected, which we then put back into circulation through a social use. This inauguration demonstrates the effectiveness of the Protocol: the State can work together with entrepreneurs in the fight against environmental crimes, we all win, from institutions to honest entrepreneurs to citizens, I can now say that the Ministry will continue to work with Ecopneus, and that these solutions that we have adopted are also being proposed to the EU Environment Ministers, where Italy has a leading position “.
