But, analysts have warned that the figures, released by Defra for the first quarter of 2004, do show a strong seasonal influence – the strong growth in glass reprocessing figures could well be because of the extra material from the Christmas period.
Overall, the statistics show that just over 1.3 million tonnes of packaging waste has been accepted for recovery or recycling by the end of March 2004. If reprocessors continue to recover packaging waste at this rate for the remaining three quarters of 2004, this would see 5,420,728 tonnes recovered or recycled this year – which is equivalent to 53% of the UK packaging waste stream.
In terms of this year's business targets, which obligated packaging producers have to reach through the purchase of packaging waste recovery notes (PRNs) from reprocessors – the figures suggest they will be met with a little to spare.
Taking account of the 332,705 tonnes worth of PRNs “carried over” from December 2003 into the 2004 figures, reprocessors should meet the overall recovery target of 63% with about 300,000 tonnes to spare.
However, it could be difficult reaching some of the materials targets – particularly in aluminium and steel packaging streams.
Metals
Calculations suggest that aluminium reprocessors are on course to recycle 28% of obligated aluminium packaging waste – just past the 26% target for this year. This represents about 2,600 tonnes of surplus reprocessing, and would suggest a difficult but not impossible task.
Steel is down considerably on last year, and some analysts have said it might be particularly difficult this year. At this current rate, for the whole of 2004 reprocessors would recover 52.1% of obligated steel packaging waste, short by about 2,300 tonnes of the 53% business target for this year.
However, other experts have said the market shouldn't rely on statistics from only one quarter of the year to predict steel reprocessing for the whole of 2004, because of the influence of seasonal discrepancies.
Paper
At the present recycling rates, and including carry over figures, paper reprocessors are on course to reprocess about 78% of obligated packaging – meeting this year's 65% target comfortably with a surplus of 380,000 tonnes. This has been widely expected, and paper PRNs are often used towards overall recovery or recycling obligations.
Glass
Glass reprocessors are on track to recover 57% of obligated material – perhaps surprisingly comfortable against the 49% reprocessing target and Defra's expectation for an increase in obligation this year.
Some analysts suggested news of this potential 180,000 tonne surplus in glass reprocessing could inflict a dampening on the current price of glass PRNs, which has been rising towards the 30 per tonne mark.
However, other experts said it would be “dangerous” to discount the seasonal effect, particularly involving Christmas, and that the glass PRN market will be much tighter than these figures suggest.
Wood
And, as expected wood reprocessing – 86.5% of obligated packaging waste – is well ahead of the 18% business target, which was set with the European Packaging Directive target for 2008 in mind than current wood recycling levels. With a potential surplus of 670,000 tonnes against the wood-specific business target, this is another material being used by obligated businesses and compliance schemes against overall recovery targets.
Plastic
Plastic reprocessors – subject to scrutiny by the Environment Agency at the moment (see letsrecycle.com story) – are on track to recycling just over 24% of obligated material in 2004 – representing about 45,000 tonnes above the 22% business target.
Revisions
However, there are some qualifications to the data Defra has released. Firstly, Defra concedes that 27 reprocessors and exporters still need to provide the Agencies with their first quarter return. The Environment Agency has confirmed to letsrecycle.com that some of these are glass reprocessors, and they are currently pursuing them for their Q1 returns.
Secondly, Defra has said that plastic tonnages are subject to revision following completion of the fact-finding mission and as a result of Agency monitoring.
And, some analysts have suggested actual obligation figures for the amount of packaging waste reported by producers could be “a little different” from Defra's published expectations.
For more on how the producer responsibility system for packaging waste operates in the UK, see the letsrecycle.com legislation section.
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