Sao Paulo integrated management plan of solid waste in the perspective of the strategic environmental assessment

Integrated Management Plans of Solid Waste are an innovative instrument management for urban waste, representing an important advance for sustainability guided by the National Solid Waste Policy. Strategic Environmental Assessment is an instrument for integrating the socio-environmental issues into policies, plans, and programs. From this question - How can Strategic Environmental Assessment contribute to the process of preparing municipal solid waste management plans in the context of the National Solid Waste Policy? - we analyzed: the suitability of the Sao Paulo waste plan to the international guidelines for Strategic Environmental Assessment good practices; and how the strategic objectives of the national policy influence the local plan by showing evidence of tiering in this planning sector. Tiering is understood as the chaining of environmental issues at different levels of planning. Some key-elements of Strategic Environmental Assessment good practices and the evidence of tiering from policy to municipal plan are observed in the Sao Paulo waste plan. Most relevant themes of Strategic Environmental Assessment are observed. Its potential benefits can recommend that Strategic Environmental Assessment has to be systematically used in the planning and management of solid waste from the national to the local scale.