EU urged not to drop paper end of waste proposals

A meeting of the European Environment Committee is taking place in Strasbourg today (October 24) to discuss a motion for resolution opposing the regulation on the end-of-waste for recovered paper.

As a result, paper merchants have called on MEPs to reject the motion which they say could kill the proposed Council Regulation setting End-of-Waste criteria for recovered paper.

Represented by the European Recovered Paper Association (ERPA) and the European Federation of Waste Management and Environmental Services (FEAD), the merchants believe there are a number of benefits to a harmonised European End-of-Waste criteria for recovered paper which plan to move the point at which paper ceases to be a waste from its current position at the paper mill to an earlier stage in the collection and sorting process.

The benefits, according to ERPA and FEAD, include: a legal certainty across the EU; a strengthening of the internal market; efficient collection; and, a higher quality of sorting, processing and recycling through its Quality Management System.
However, the proposals have divided the paper industry with stinging criticism from mill operators represented by the Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI) who believe the legislation could lead to a reduction in quality and recycling rates (see letsrecycle.com story).

A vote on whether or not to adopt the motion for a resolution in the European Parliament Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety will take place on November 5 2013. If the motion is adopted then a plenary vote will take place in December. If the end-of-waste criteria are adopted, the regulation under which it falls would apply from January 1 2014.

Arguments

In a joint statement, FEAD and ERPA explained why they want the motion for resolution to be rejected: ERPA, FEAD and CEPI (paper mills) have intensively worked on the European CEN Standard EN643 for recovered paper and board which has been adopted by all the stakeholders in the paper recycling chain.

The 1.5% threshold for non-paper components in end-of-waste paper in the Council Regulation was purposefully aligned with the threshold in the CEN standard. Therefore, arguments that the Council Regulation, which transposes into binding legislation this 1.5% threshold for non-paper components will lead to low quality recycling is simply false.

Status quo

Speaking to letsrecycle.com today (October 23), Ross Bartley, environmental and technical officer at ERPA, said: We would not want to see the council regulation disrupted on the grounds that have been put forward in the motion for resolution because each of those issues has been well addressed. The Environment Committee has been lobbied very heavily into putting this motion for a resolution together which would stop the council regulation.

If it stops it [the end of waste] it just leaves everyone where they are and leaves us in a status quo and there is no change so the improvements that the End of Waste would bring dont come.

Discussing the likely outcome of the meeting, Mr Bartley adds: Maybe there is a 50/50 chance and maybe the Environment Committee will realise that the council regulation actually brings some benefits. What it does do is promote the sorting and separation of material within Europe.