_{^{By Nick Mann}} 

The Environment Agency has successfully brought a prosecution against a Merseyside-based company over the illegal export to Hong Kong of hazardous waste electrical and electronic equipment originally collected from civic amenity sites in Cumbria.

The Merseyside firm Sinoway was prosecuted for the illegal export of hazardous waste electrical and electronic equipment to Hong Kong

Sinoway International Limited was last week (July 14) ordered by Workington Magistrates Court to pay a fine of £2,000 and costs of £2,700, after pleading guilty to the illegal export of the material in a container which included several hundred computer monitors classed as hazardous waste.

And, Cumbria Recycling Ltd, the Workington-based not-for-profit WEEE reuse company which collected the WEEE from the CA sites, received a formal caution from the Environment Agency, after accepting that it had been involved in the illegal export by selling the waste to Sinoway and loading it into the container.

Under waste shipment regulations, the shipment of hazardous waste for disposal to non-OECD regions such as Hong Kong and China is not allowed.

In a statement following the sentencing, the Environment Agency explained that it had received information from the Hong Kong Environmental Protection Department on November 20 2009 about a suspected illegal hazardous waste shipment from the UK.

The container had been inspected and opened on landing, where it was found to container WEEE including the computer monitors, which were classed as hazardous waste due to the nature of some of their components.

Documents found in the container indicated St Helens-based Sinoway had exported the waste from Cumbria Recycling Ltd to Hong Kong in September 2009, prompting EA officers to contact Sinoway, who then arranged for the waste to be immediately returned to the UK.

Upon return in December 2009, EA officers inspected the container and found a number of waste electrical items, including cables, monitors, base units, components and wires, with the contents being poorly packed and, in some cases, visibly damaged.

Cumbria Recycling Ltd

The Agency explained that, while Cumbria Recycling Ltd operates by refurbishing and repairing electrical equipment collected from CA sites with any beyond repair being sent for reprocessing, many of the items in the container were considered beyond repair but had been sold to Sinoway instead of being sent for domestic reprocessing.

Cumbria Recycling claimed Sinoway was fully aware the goods were hazardous waste, but accepted their involvement in the illegal export, and, once the container had been returned to the UK they paid for the entire contents of it to be sent for reprocessing in the UK.

Commenting on the significance of the case, Steve Johnston, environment officer, said: "This case sends out a strong message to other export companies that WEEE cannot be exported to other countries. The Environment Agency will continue to take enforcement action against such offenders.

"If the container had not been detained in Hong Kong and returned to the UK, there is a significant risk that the waste in the container would have been mishandled or tipped, causing environmental harm," he added.

The issue of illegal WEEE exports has regularly been highlighted as one of the main challenges facing the UK WEEE sector and those responsible for regulating it, with the national media claiming in February 2009 that irreparable WEEE collected at Hampshire county council's CA sites had been classed as fit for reuse and sent to Africa (see letsrecycle.com story).

When contacted by letsrecycle.com yesterday, Sinoway International said it had no comment to make about the case, while Cumbria Recycling Ltd was unavailable for comment.