According to the Agency, it is seeking to avoid ‘costly and time-consuming’ legal action and will aim to ‘enable’ compliance with the regulations as far as possible, when the separate collection requirements of the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations come into force from January 2015.
A briefing note outlining details of the Agency’s planned approach for regulating the new regime has been distributed to stakeholders at meetings this month, as the Agency seeks to prepare the public and private sectors for the roll out of the regulations (see letsrecycle.com story).
Under the regulations, separate collections of at least paper, metal, plastic and glass for household and commercial waste are a legal requirement, unless it is not technically, environmentally or economically practicable or necessary to allow high quality recycling of the material.
MRFs
Information from materials recycling facilities (MRFs) over the amount of contamination received in mixed loads of recyclable materials received from collectors is likely to be a key tool in the policing of the requirements.
In its briefing document, the Agency states: “Separate collection is a legal requirement which the EA has a duty to enforce. As with all regulation, our aim is to enable compliance as far as possible. This means that we would work with collectors to help them to comply, by holding practical conversations or issuing warnings in the first instance.”
It adds: “Further action would be taken only where this proved necessary. We want to keep enforcement action to a minimum and as a last resort as it is costly and time-consuming to both parties. Collectors are therefore advised to seek their own legal advice to support decisions they make on collectors.”
Practicability
The Agency continues that practicable solutions are likely to vary according to the type, size and make-up of each waste collection authority or collection firm, but that it will expect to see that collectors have ‘thoroughly reviewed’ the considerations based on evidence.
“’Practicability’ is intended to be a high hurdle,” the Agency’s note explains. “Impracticable does not just mean difficult, inconvenient, more expensive or unpopular.”
On the monitoring of potential breaches of the regulations, the Agency has confirmed that it will be monitoring returns from sorting facilities which will be publicly available when the MRF Regulations come into effect from October. This will be used to assess both the quality and quantity of recycled material being collected.
Details of the indicators that will point to non compliance have also been released, with the Agency outlining activities that are likely to lead to a high, medium or low level of compliance. Further details of this ‘risk based’ approach can be viewed in the table above.
More of the specific details over how the regulations will be enforced are still being developed by the Agency and are likely to be finalised once it has completed discussions with the waste collection sectors. This will be followed by a full media campaign outlining the finalised approach which will commence in November.
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