And, as well as looking at boundaries in terms of operations in England, Viridor is also recommending a “shift in the country’s resources policy from one that encourages wastefulness to one based on preserving material, generating demand for high-quality recyclate to enable investment in ‘next generation’ recycling and recovery infrastructure”.
The call for change comes in a Viridor Policy Briefing launched at letsrecycle.com’s ‘Remunicipalisation Conference’ in London yesterday (29 January) – which saw private and public sector experts debate the benefits of insourcing or outsourcing waste services. (Click here to see the report, as a PDF.)
In the paper, Viridor argues that fully integrated English Resource Networks are necessary to achieve collection of consistent, high quality materials by councils and businesses as well as planning the delivery of waste infrastructure at a regional scale.
The Networks would work in an ‘aggregated manner’ by allowing councils, business and regulators to operate at scale and take advantage of the European Commission’s emerging Circular Economy framework.
Decisions
The Policy Paper is titled: “Building English Resource Networks: The Aggregated Services Model”. It notes that in contrast to what is proposed today’s picture in England is far different: “Even now decisions about collections, contracts and infrastructure are still often based on arbitrary political boundaries by authorities not focused on the value of resources to the national economy”.
Viridor suggests that the Networks should look to its own PFI partnership with Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority – which has attracted ‘inward investment from manufacturers and contributes to decentralised energy provision’.
Its report also highlights support for increased harmonisation of recycling collections – introducing ‘mandatory common standards’ for councils and businesses.
And, it endorses running pilot collection schemes for specific materials such as paper, glass and waste electronic and electrical equipment.
Inflexion
Launching the report, Viridor business development director Chris Jonas said: “We’ve reached a point of inflexion in what we are doing.”
He cited that “recycling had become static around 45%, regulators had faced cuts in staff and budget, there is a long term decline in the value of commodities and there is a need to embrace the circular economy package.”
Expanding on the report’s ideas of the need for a modern approach to infrastructure systems, he said: “But the bit we are not really talking about at the moment is the recycling technologies which are aging and becoming obsolete. We need to look at what need to reach 50% and then 65% recycling.
“The opportunity exists now with the circular economy launch to restructure waste policy”, added Mr Jonas.
Quality
The new approach requires the right mix of resources so that an “unnecessary burden is not put on councils, households and businesses” the Viridor director noted. “We need to lock in quality as an equal KPI in what we and need to consider this on a broader set of boundaries. We have to look at what we are going to collect and at how do we maintain that value as well as the need to create the right environment for more investment in recycling technology.”
And, reflecting on recent concerns about lower values of recyclables, Mr Jonas declared: “We can’t always be moaning about the lack of recycling income. We have to think of a new way of doing it”.
The video below is of Chris Jonas outlining the report:
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