Speaking to letsrecycle.com yesterday (September 17), Graeme Milne, sales manager for Viridor Electrical Recycling, warned that if the EU changed its WEEE collection targets from weight-based to higher, market-based goals, the UK would need to have a “long, hard think” about how it could capture small WEEE.
He explained: “We have picked off most of the easy bits; if the EU target is significantly higher we're going to have to have a long hard think about how we can capture more consumer equipment.”
Under its current review of the WEEE Directive, the EU has proposed that member states' WEEE collection targets change from the 4kg per head goal, which the UK has comfortably met since 2007, to a market-based goal, which would see the UK having to increase its collection rate from a current level of around 38% to 65% in just a few years (see letsrecycle.com story).
Awareness
Mr Milne welcomed the news that WRAP-led awareness scheme pilots run earlier this year had boosted small WEEE collection rates by up to 30%, resulting in plans to make the promotional materials available to councils across England (see letsrecycle.com story).
But, he stressed that ideally an awareness campaign would be available across the UK, including Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
“I'd like to see it integrated across the UK,” Mr Milne said. “Those campaigns work best when they're integrated as much as possible.”
“I am not really sure at the moment whether your average Joe Public realises a) its easy and b) its environmentally the best thing to do,” he added, explaining that “I think we need to do some joined-up thinking.”
Stakeholders
While he noted that the WEEE system had “so many” stakeholders, Mr Milne suggested that the potential higher collection targets could see them having to work together.
In particular, he raised the possibility of producer compliance schemes having to include details of how they planned to publicise WEEE recycling in the operational plans they must have approved by the Agency.
This would mirror the situation in the nascent battery recycling system, where prospective compliance schemes are expected to support publicity campaigns and encouraged to work together on them.
Recycling and recovery
The EU's proposed changes to the Directive would also see higher recycling and reuse requirements being put in place for individual items of WEEE, a move that some in the sector have suggested could force out reprocessors who recycle WEEE to the minimum efficiencies required.
This move was welcomed by Mr Milne, who explained that: “Any increase in the environmental standards is good news.”
“Any legislative factors moving forward that result in increasing standards would be very commendable from our point of view,” he added.
Viridor Electrical Recycling
Viridor Electrical Recycling currently has two facilities – one in Perth, in Scotland, and the other in St Helens, on Merseyside – which were purchased by parent company Viridor from their then-owner Shore Recycling in March 2008 for £23 million (see letsrecycle.com story).
The St Helens plant was hit by fire in July 2008 (see letsrecycle.com story), but Mr Milne revealed that, after taking the decision to “rip out the kit and put in new equipment” in the aftermath of the blaze, the facility was now expected to be fully up-and-running later this year.
He explained that commissioning was currently taking place in the fridge recycling part of the plant, while the adjacent small WEEE facility was set to be operational before the end of 2009.
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