A working document obtained by letsrecycle.com suggests that talks between the European Council, Parliament and Commission are considering avoiding confusion over the definition of the term 'recovery' rather than resolving it.
The terms of the directive were thrown into confusion in February 2003 when a European Court of Justice ruling said that the disposal of packaging waste in cement kilns could be defined as recovery, but that sending material to a municipal waste incinerator was primarily to dispose of it, not to recover energy from it.
It had been thought that this ruling could mean any incineration of packaging waste – with or without energy recovery – would no longer count towards producer responsibility recovery targets.
But the working document of the conciliation process reveals that the European discussions may avoid the issue entirely by adding the incineration term to the clause stating the recovery target for December 2008.
The new version of Article 6, paragraph 1(b) of the Directive 94/62/EC would therefore read: “No later than 31 December 2008, 60% as a minimum by weight of packaging waste will be recovered or incinerated at waste incineration plants with energy recovery“. (New text emphasised)
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In the case of the UK, the possible effect of a ban on packaging incineration has now been reduced by the new government target for “minimum recovery by recycling” of 94% for 2004 rising to 95% in 2006. However, an outright ban would still mean the UK having to find the reprocessing capacity for more than 400,000 tonnes extra each year.
In the rest of Europe, it had been feared that a number of Member States – including Denmark, which incinerates about 50% of its municipal waste – would fail to reach their targets by a wide margin if incineration of packaging no longer counted towards recovery.
The amendment of the packaging directive to include the incineration component came as the Council and Parliament negotiated a final agreed position on new targets for 2008 as originally proposed by Dutch MEP Dorette Corbey. The amendments, which are also expected to include clarified positions on whether items such as flower pots and CD cases count as packaging, are to be completed by the end of this month.
It is thought that Europe may clarify “other relevant legislation” such as the Waste Framework Directive concerning recovery in the same way as in the packaging directive.
The European Environmental Bureau (EEB), an umbrella organisation for European pressure groups – said today that it was “was deeply concerned” with the developments. The EEB suggested to letsrecycle.com that by changing the wording of the amendment in this way at this late stage and with no consultation, what the European bodies were doing was “highly illegal”.
Roberto Ferrigno, EU policy director at the EEB, said: “This amendment, in hasty last-minute conciliation negotiations, has set a dubious precedent in EU waste-policy making. It has circumvented the clear procedural guidelines of the treaty, in highly un-transparent and obscure procedures, and undermined the Community waste management hierarchy by placing targets for incineration with energy recovery (disposal) of packaging waste on the same hierarchical level as recovery (recycling).”
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