The company, which operates the WeeeCare producer compliance scheme as well as an Approved Authorised Treatment Facility (AATF) in Normanton.
In a statement, the company said that while it would be ‘easy to accept the lower targets’ due to its PCS commitments, higher targets are needed to encourage greater recycling of waste electricals.
The group pointed to the difference between the amount of WEEE collected in the UK and that placed on the market as evidence of the availability of sufficient tonnage to meet targets.
“Our concern is that the potential risks to the environment of this missing tonnage from the formal treatment and recycling routes are not being taken into account in considering the targets,” the company said in a statement.
Whilst WasteCare acknowledged a valid used EEE market for some WEEE, it added that “this cannot be the primary cause of the gap which occurs on a similar scale year after year”.
EU targets
The EU WEEE Directive set out a 65% collection target of WEEE placed onto the market by 2019. Since 2013, the proportion of WEEE collected through the UK’s producer compliance system has remained around 40% of WEEE placed on the market. Last year, it was around 39%.
Some have put this down to changing consumer behaviour, suggesting consumers are now ‘hoarding’ electricals in their homes. Others say not enough is being done to collect the WEEE, and particularly with small WEEE items that people are simply disposing of it through waste streams such as household residual bins.
WasteCare said it was concerned that the assumption that substantiated estimates would plug any gap between the current percentage and that proposed under the EU WEEE directive.
It said that there appears to be little evidence to support the levels of substantiated estimated being use, “both in volume terms or the methods of treatment”.
As outlined below, the group called for a 3% increase in overall 2018 collection targets.
The Leeds-based company added: “As has been seen with the current crisis on paper and plastic exports, to simply adopt the lowest cost free market approach undermines the UK’s ability to not only meet the Directive requirement, but also the Government’s rated aim to leave the environment in a better condition than when it started.”
WEEE Conference
6 June 2018, Cavendish Conference Centre
WEEE collection rates and progress towards future targets will be among the topics covered at the 2018 WEEE Conference. Join us to debate these issues and more.
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