Waste Framework Directive deadline passes

The deadline for the revised EU Waste Framework Directive to be transposed into UK law passed yesterday (December 12), with Defra confirming that it does not expect to lay the regulations which will enshrine the document in domestic legislation until January 2011.

However, the department stressed that EU officials had been “kept informed” of its progress. And, it is thought unlikely that Europe's governing body, the European Commission, will take any action against the government for not bringing the regulations into force before yesterday's deadline given the progress it has made to date.

These requirements include achieving a 50% household waste recycling and composting rate by 2020, and a 70% target for construction and demolition waste by the same date, while the Directive makes it a legal requirement for all waste management activities to adhere to the new five-step waste hierarchy.

The hierarchy means that future decisions on waste policy, management and developing infrastructure will be expected to take into account the hierarchy, which priorities prevention, preparing for reuse, recycling, recovery and then disposal as the final option.

Commenting on the government's progress to date, a Defra spokeswoman told letsrecycle.com: “The revised Waste Framework Directive introduces some new and significant measures on how we deal with waste. A two-stage consultation process was started in July 2009 to give people and businesses the chance to have their say on how these changes should be put in place.

“The second part of the consultation opened in July this year. Responses are being considered and we expect to lay the Regulations before Parliament in January. EU officials have been kept informed of progress.”

End-of-waste

Certain parts of the Directive are still in the process of being decided at a European level.
This includes establishing criteria for metals which would free them from waste regulation and developing a regulation confirming what does and doesn't count towards the recycling targets set in article 11 of the Directive.

End-of-waste criteria for ferrous and aluminium scrap metals were considered by a meeting of the European Technical Adaptation Committee for the Directive in September 2010 (see letsrecycle.com story).

They are expected to reduce metals recyclers' regulatory burden, but the government has said they may also create problems for the UK's packaging recycling system by undermining one of its founding principles – that only reprocessors can issue evidence, or PRNs, of packaging having been recycled.

Defra has since confirmed that the criteria fell one short of the number of votes needed for approval by the TAC, under the Commission's system of deciding on regulations and legislation known as comitology.

But, under this system, the criteria have now been referred by the Commission to the European Council of environment ministers, which is expected to vote on them at its December 20 meeting, and can only block the proposals if it musters a qualified – or absolute – majority against them.

As such, the criteria are thought likely to be approved, a move that will mean that, from some point in 2011, recovered ferrous and aluminium scrap meeting the criteria will no longer have to meet waste regulations such as the transfrontier shipment rules which limit their export outside Europe.

Organics

Also providing an update on the draft European regulation detailing what does and doesn't count towards the recycling and composting targets set by the Directive, Defra outlined a Commission proposal which continues to suggest that compost or digestate that does not meet quality standards will count towards the goals.

In August 2010, the Commission's position was that inputs to anaerobic digestion and composting facilities could still count as recycled if the output was used in an R10, or land treatment, operation (see letsrecycle.com story).

And, the Commission's definition had now been formally expanded to cover compost and digestate that was “where necessary after further treatment, used as recycled products, materials or substances for land treatment resulting in benefit to agriculture or ecological improvement”.

This regulation, Defra noted, is not subject to a vote by EU member states, but is going to involve the Commission consulting further with them before potentially adopting it under a process known as written procedure.

This involves the proposal being submitted to all member states in writing, who can then request a debate on it at a forthcoming Commission meeting or, if there are no changes or concerns, it will just be adopted as a regulation.