Kerbside WEEE snapped up in North East

Kerbside collection of waste electrical and electronic equipment is frequent in the North East through white van man and itinerant scrap metal collectors, delegates to the North East Recycling Forum declared last week.

But, a representative of one of the largest compliance schemes told the audience that residents should use civic amenity sites for WEEE and that kerbside collections were not effective.

The delegates to the event, who come from the private and public sector, spoke of their personal experiences in a session on waste electrical and electronic equipment which had Wayne Copley, procurement director for the compliance scheme Repic, as guest speaker.

In his presentation, Mr Copley had spoken of the missing tonnes of WEEE (waste electrical and electronic equipment) compared to the EEE (electrical and electronic equipment) being placed on the market by producers.

And, in response to questions about why kerbside collections of WEEE were not carried out, Mr Copley told delegates that in his view organised kerbside collection schemes did not work.

Kerbside

Pointing to his own situation, having, for example a number of mobile phones, the Repic director said: In some places collections take place now but it is not very effective. The mindset of the consumer is not there for collections at the kerbside. I ask whether the collections, for myself for example, would tempt me to take my old mobile phones out of the drawer.

And, Mr Copley said that where kerbside collections had been carried out, data for the amount of material recovered showed that where 1,000 tonnes of material was expected over a period of time, they got 24 tonnes.

He suggested that instead of operating kerbside collection schemes, local authorities would be better advised to ensure householders remembered to take electrical items with them when they made their trips to the tip.

The audience, however, was at one over the fact that kerbside collections of materials by white van man and scrap collectors are taking large amounts of metal and WEEE goods. Andrew Craig, a policy adviser to LARAC said: All you have to do is leave these items out on the drive.

“As a collector we collect from a larger portion of the population through local authorities than any other producer compliance scheme.

Wayne Copley, Repic

And, Environment Agency officials present conceded that white man van is operating the kerbside service. Another said, speaking personally, that she considered some might say these collectors offer a brilliant service when all you have to do is put the scrap outside.

Scheme

In his presentations to the Forum, Mr Copley explained that Repic is the largest WEEE compliance scheme in the UK, responsible for around 50% of the WEEE collected in the UK, about four times bigger than any other compliance scheme. As a collector we collect from a larger portion of the population through local authorities than any other producer compliance scheme.

The Repic procurement director also touched on the issue of under and over collection by compliance schemes and said: We are closer to balance than at any time in the past.
He explained that the scheme works with producers, retailers and others to try to make sure there is no financial burden on the local authorities.

According to Mr Copley, Statistics data from 2010 shows that there was:

• 1,206,246 EEE tonnes on the market
• 500,621 WEEE tonnes collected
• Average UK person buys 20 kilos of EEE, disposes of 8
• Difference is 12kilos per person

He asked what happened to the 12 kilos per person which was effectively missing and suggested that some small WEEE sat in the house and some was lost to white van men. When he is collecting big items he may well take smaller items.

Missing WEEE

Some of the missing WEEE may also be going to second life markets and unrecorded reuse as well as to non-authorised treatment facilities. This all means that we are seeing WEEE lost to the UK WEEE system. And, he warned that some routes could be open to illegal export activities. White van man in particular is open to illegal export which is a big worry for quite a few people.

He gave figures to show what Repic perceived as the real WEEE gap, which was not simply the statistical difference between EEE sales and the amount of material in the WEEE system.

The data shows a supposed gap of 705,626 tonnes but Mr Copley said that allowing a variety of reasons such as different weights televisions, for example are becoming lighter and lighter, some 69,578 tonnes of WEEE is being lost each year although UK authorities are now clamping down.

Mr Copley urged those local authorities present to link with your PCS, actively engage, make sure they are trying to look after your interest.