The need for adequate treatment and disposal of waste by man, arose as populations
moved away from disperse geographical areas to congregate together in communities.
The higher populations of towns and cities resulted in a concentration of generated waste,
such that it became a nuisance problem. Waste became such a problem for the citizens of
Athens in Greece that, around 500 BC, a law was issued banning the throwing of rubbish
into the streets. It was required that the waste be transported by scavengers to an open
dump one mile outside of the city. The first records that waste was being burned as a
disposal route appear in the early years of the first millennium in Palestine.