Local authorities&#39 share of 40 million fridge fund is announced

The money, to be awarded in the financial year beginning April 2003, will help councils who were forced to pay extra costs for the storage and treatment of around one million old fridges this year after the government agreed to a European Union law that UK industry was unprepared for.

EC Regulation 2037/2000 required removal of CFCs from fridge foam and coolant and came into force on January 1, 2002. But CFC extraction from foam did not become available in the UK until July 2002, leading councils to either stockpile or export old fridges.

Criticised

In July 2002, the Environment Select Committee criticised the government for signing up the EU legislation while failing to make adequate provision for the possibility that the law would apply to CFC foam as well as coolant (see letsrecycle.com story).

A grant report put to other MPs last week by Mrs Beckett, the Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said: “DEFRA are responsible for securing provision for additional costs that local authorities face as a result of the Regulation.”

DEFRA provided 6 million to local authorities earlier this year to cover the period from January 1 – March 31, 2002. The 40 million fund will provide for costs faced from April 1, 2002 – March 31, 2003.

Kent County Council has been allocated the biggest chunk of the fund – 972,860. Essex County Council and Birmingham City Council were also awarded significant amounts – 932,465 and 881,354 respectively. The smallest award was made to the Isles of Scilly, at 2,474.

The House of Commons is provisionally due to debate and decide whether to approve the grant on December 5, 2002. A spokesman for DEFRA said letters would be sent to council chief executives with details of how and when to claim their allocated funds.

For a full list of allocations made to local authorities, click here.

Devon

Meanwhile, Devon County Council has awarded a 1.4 million contract to UK company Technowaste to dispose of the county's old fridges for the next three years.

Since June 2002, Technowaste has exported 14,000 of Devon's fridges to a recycling centre in Holland. Having won the new contract, the company will continue exporting fridges for another six months, and then begin recycling them in the UK at one of its two new plants.

Councillor David Morrish said: “Within the next three years we hope to see a European directive which will place the responsibility for the disposal of fridges back with the manufacturers. Until then, this contract gives us the longer-term solution we need to ensure Devon's fridges and freezers are disposed of safely and efficiently.”

Devon, which is due to get 455,686 from the special grant, estimates it will handle 36,000 waste fridges every year.