Concerns were raised to letsrecycle.com over the term “exclusive” following an announcement on October 24 (see letsrecycle.com story)
.
Describing the agreement between Valpak and SITA, the two companies released a statement. This said: “The five year contract will give Valpak exclusive access to PRNs generated from SITA’s existing recycling and EfW facilities, and in common with all Valpak contracts, SITA as a reprocessor will ensure that the PRN revenue will be used to fund further development of recycling capacity.”
Concerns centred on whether the agreement might unfairly restrict other parties from accessing the PRNs. But a spokesman from Valpak, the UK's largest compliance scheme which handles around 60% of the packaging waste compliance market, said that he had been in touch with various industry figures and that no one was objecting to the SITA deal as far as he was aware.
“Valpak is mystified at the charge that we have entered into uncompetitive practises with our recent agreement with SITA,” a statement from the compliance scheme said. “The terms of the recent agreement involve around 1% of the total number of PRNs available annually in the UK. If we look specifically at energy from waste, the agreement with SITA covers approximately 10% of the total PRN capacity.”
The Valpak spokesman explained that the agreement made with SITA was merely formalising what had already taken place previously, and that the deal hadn't changed arrangements much between the two companies. He also said that SITA's energy from waste capacity was “nowhere near competing with Onyx”.
Regulations
SITA's Paul Dumpleton was equally perplexed at the concerns of anti-competitiveness.
He admitted that the word “exclusive” used in connection with the deal could have troubled some in the industry. He said that guidance from the Environment Agency put out when the PRN system came into being may have advised against “exclusive” arrangements.
“In the initial regulations, there was mention of exclusivity,” he said, “but I'm aware of other reprocessors and compliance schemes with exclusive deals for quantities of PRNs, so if we're to be castigated then everybody should be castigated.”
Continued on page 2
Subscribe for free