A rise in exports of refuse derived fuel (RDF) for recovery in Europe is likely to have been caused by a monopoly position of waste disposal firms in the UK over the collection and recycling sector, a prominent RDF exporter has claimed.
N+P Alternative Fuels made the comments in its response to the governments two-month-long call for evidence on the RDF export market, which closed earlier this month. The company claimed that it would seek to work with UK operators more regularly if supply guarantees were available from the UK market.
Defra launched its consultation in March to assess whether there is a need to take action to ensure that the waste hierarch is fully applied by producers of the material.
Its publication followed a rise in the amount of RDF from England being sent abroad for processing as well as concerns that the practice is open to abuse from some operators.
According to the company, the collection and recycling sector for commercial and industrial waste is highly competitive with a number of small and medium firms serving local markets, while the waste disposal market is dominated by a relatively small number of national and international firms.
Costs
N+P states that due to this imbalance, particularly as landfill sites continue to dwindle, waste collection and recycling firms face substantial rises in disposal costs.
‘The introduction of RDF processing and export has provided flexibility in the market giving SME recyclers power to choose routes thereby alleviating the monopolistic tendencies of the operators of the large facilities.’
N+P Alternative Fuels
In its consultation response, the company added: The introduction of RDF processing and export has provided flexibility in the market giving SME recyclers power to choose routes thereby alleviating the monopolistic tendencies of the operators of the large facilities.
This enables the collection and recycling sector to provide competitively priced services to UK business. The loss of this outlet would create a hiatus that may result in the collapse of this very efficient market with resulting on-cost to the many businesses served and loss of recycling capacity.
Recovery
Meanwhile N+P has also claimed that the vast majority of EfW facilities currently operating in the UK would not be classed as recovery outlets under the Waste Framework Directive due to not having R1 status and exporting material to facilities overseas can guarantee that material is sent for recovery and not disposal.
N+P added: This also raises the concern that as most if not all local authority supply contracts to existing UK EfW plants have been entered into predicated on the expectation that the waste is going for recovery and therefore meeting local recovery targets the use of EfW plants that lack R1 accreditation may bring these contracts into disrepute.
The company also echoed other respondents in opposing the establishment of a formal standard for RDF. Instead it has argued that different codes should be applied for the three different types of material commonly moved.
The three grades include:
- Low grade coarse RDF only suitable for EfW;
- High grade coarse RDF suitable for re-processing for SRF cement kilns or pelletizing for alternative fuels for the coal fired power stations, and:
- SRF for cement kilns.
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The company produces biomass, SRF and refuse derived fuel (RDF) in the UK for European markets, shipping material to Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany. In March it signed a deal to export up to 500,000 tonnes of SRF to Cemex Latvia over ten years (see letsrecycle.com story).
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