Purpose – The purpose of this paper is twofold. Understanding if knowledge management can help local governments develop more effective environmental policies and, if so, to provide some guidelines to increase the uptake of knowledge in the policy process. This requires discovering the recurring good or bad knowledge management practices within some zero waste initiatives undertaken by municipalities. The human and material resources available for the local authorities are obviously scarce; therefore, being able to identify some useful elements for the success of an environmental policy can save time and resources, and, above all, can save irreversible damage to the environment (i.e. the use of landfill practices). Design/methodology/approach – Research strategy is a qualitative case study approach, using a qualitative approach to data collection and analysis. We used existing data from previous research done by Robert Krausz for his own PhD thesis and official documents available on websites dedicated to zero waste initiatives. The rationale for using existing data is the perfect coincidence of the study population and also the unit of analysis. The study population is the complete set of local government zero waste programs which exist, or have ever existed; the unit of analysis is an individual zero waste program taken from this population. Results are analysed using specific theoretical perspectives. Originality/value – This paper puts forward evidence for the value of the knowledge management discipline in the design and implementation of a zero waste strategy. It is known that the implementation of all municipal policies is laborious, time-consuming and expensive, so it may be useful to know in advance all the determinants of the success of a policy. When we talk about environmental issues, it becomes even more important considering that some environmental problems are irreversible (e.g. the pollution of an aquifer in proximity to a landfill); the failure of an environmental policy could have disastrous consequences.
Practical implications – The outcomes of the application is related to the fact that municipal waste management is one of the key areas of municipal environmental policy and is also the item on which citizens spend most resources. Therefore, for a good environmental policy a wide range of tools needs to be used, including knowledge management discipline, to obtain ever improving results. There are many municipalities who have adopted a zero waste strategy and many of those who have adopted one have benefited from it, considering all possible factors critical to the success of this strategy.
Keywords – Knowledge management, public sector, knowledge to policy, municipal solid waste, zero waste strategies