Compliance schemes scramble to sign up battery producers

The Bristol-based company, which already operates compliance schemes for WEEE and packaging, has revealed that it will be looking to register its scheme for batteries under the name the 'cube initiative', with the different sides of a cube representing all the different activities required for successful compliance.

The scheme will be heavily influenced by its members and its success and direction will result from the involvement of its producers and distributors within the stakeholder group

 
Stephen Clark, managing director, Budget Pack

The announcement comes just days before the May 31 deadline for prospective battery compliance schemes to submit their scheme application to the environment agencies.

Speaking to letsrecycle.com, Budget Pack's managing director, Stephen Clark, said that the initiative would aim to provide a “complete one-stop-shop solution” for compliance with the battery regulations.

He explained that a key aspect of the 'cube initiative' scheme would be to bring onboard the approaches already being used by producers and distributors to collect batteries.

“We want to produce a solution for those guys which does not affect the systems they have in place,” he said, explaining that “if there's a producer out there that has a very specific set-up then they can still use it”.

However, Mr Clark also stressed that the scheme was also open to producers who didn't have any infrastructure in place, and said it would provide a publicity campaign, membership compliance services and a collection infrastructure.

“We are able to support companies that don't have any infrastructure, we are able to provide the total compliance scheme infrastructure – we'll put in place all the checks using our team of consultants,” he said.

Mr Clark claimed that Budget Pack had a number of “expert partners” in place to provide that infrastructure, and explained that the initiative would be looking to bring together “as many aspects as possible” of the UK's battery collection and recycling system.

Costs

In a bid to keep its members' costs down, Mr Clark explained that the initiative would also look to spread best practice in collection from one group of its members to another.

“We'll be able to identify where we've got collection systems for a group of companies that might also work for another group of companies who might be able to use that to reduce costs,” he said.

Commenting further on the scheme's aims, he said: “The scheme will be heavily influenced by its members and its success and direction will result from the involvement of its producers and distributors within the stakeholder group.

“We feel duty bound to ensure that companies affected by this legislation can have their say in the running of a scheme – after all, we are here to provide a compliance scheme for our members,” he added.

As a result, Budget Pack is encouraging producers, distributors, battery collectors and others in the sector to become involved in its stakeholder group.

And, it plans to hold an “interactive seminar” at its offices in Bristol on June 9 to discuss the impact of the batteries regulations with producers and distributors.

Competition

Budget Pack joins an ever-growing list of prospective battery compliance schemes, with some in the sector predicting fierce competition between the schemes that do receive approval to sign up as many producer members as possible (see letsrecycle.com story).

Valpak, which claims to operate the UK's largest 'pre-compliance' information service for all those obligated under the battery regulations, has also called on producers to get in touch with it about what its scheme can offer.

The scheme's chief executive, Steve Gough, said: “Battery producers have until October this year to register with us but it would be a good idea to start planning and budgeting as soon as possible.

“The costs are difficult to estimate and the only publicly available figures are from short term trial data which is unfortunately not representative.

“However, Valpak are currently offering budget estimates for our members and we are confident that we can, as with other producer responsibility regimes, match or beat any competition,” he added.