However, the government has indicated it is unlikely to review UK business recovery targets before 2005 despite the European developments.
In new packaging waste recovery and recycling targets for 2004-08, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs demanded that 94% of UK packaging waste recovery must be through recycling, rising to 95% in 2007 and 2008. This was because a European Court of Justice ruling had cast doubt on whether the incineration of packaging waste counted towards European recovery targets.
However, an agreement between European bodies last week declared that incineration of packaging waste would count towards recovery targets (see letsrecycle.com story).
The UK's new packaging waste regulations have now passed through Parliament, a government spokesman said, and to scrap the 94% minimum in the light of the latest European position would require the government to consult and lay down new regulations before Parliament. Such a move would take “up to a year”, he said.
But, since the new regulations were “endorsed by industry”, the DEFRA spokesman said the government would only be reviewing the 94% minimum in the next review of the packaging regulations as a whole.
He said: “We intend to take stock of where we are, possibly in 2005 or 2006, reviewing all the targets as necessary, including the 94/95% minimum (recovery by) recycling targets.”
Disadvantage
In 2003, the UK recovered about 560,000 tonnes of packaging waste through energy-from-waste rather than recycling. The 94% minimum recycling requirement demanded by the UK regulations will mean this will have to reduce to around 320,000 tonnes in 2004, despite no requirement by Europe to do so.
Consequently some in the UK industry have revealed concerns to letsrecycle.com that this gold-plating of European requirements will put obligated businesses in this country at a comparative disadvantage compared to those in other European Member States.
A senior figure in the packaging sector said: “This European decision makes a significant difference. The UK government, therefore, in the light of this decision, should immediately look at changing the regulations. The UK is now out of step with the rest of Europe, so it could be asked whether these regulations are valid. If these regulations are not hastily amended during the course of the year, obligated companies in the UK will be penalised and face higher costs than their counterparts in Europe.”
PRN prices
Another expert suggested that unless the 94% minimum was scrapped, the price of packaging waste recovery notes (PRNs) would be overly high, meaning an unduly high cost of compliance for those businesses obligated under the packaging waste regulations.
But responding to the comments, the government spokesman denied the 94% minimum would have any effect on PRN prices since obligated businesses and compliance schemes would tend to buy paper and wood PRNs in place of the energy from waste PRNs, and prices were “similar”.
The spokesman said: “The 94% minimum recycling target will mean that obligated producers will have to purchase recycling PRNs rather than energy from waste PRNs. Paper and wood PRNs have tended to be a similar price to EfW PRNs and the government does not envisage this target forcing up the cost of compliance with the directive targets.”
DEFRA has said it would be interested to hear from industry over the issue of the 94% limit.
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