The group, which runs the Wastepack packaging waste compliance scheme, commissioned an independent study, from Bruce Bratley Associates, to look at the extent to which PRN funding has caused real increases in packaging waste recycling during the period 1998-2001. The findings are expected to add to the current debate about PRNs and whether or not they are working and are the best mechanism to deliver increases in packaging recycling.
The study was commissioned as part of an appraisal of the market, to help Wastepack support its business planning process and inform its response to various consultations about future targets.
The main conclusions of the research are that:
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an additional 250,000 tonnes of new reprocessing capacity has been brought on-stream since 1998
this increment has cost approximately 1,000 per tonne
if past rates of growth are projected forward it will take between 14 and 30 years, at a cost of 1.8 billion, to meet a Packaging Directive target of 60% recovery.
The report argues that in its current format the PRN funding system cannot deliver the proposed 2006 Packaging Directive targets and that if future targets are to be met, a more proactive approach to recycling packaging waste needs to be adopted.
Wastepack said that the research tends to confirm its view “that funding from business has mainly been used to support the existing recycling activity, rather than increase capacity to fill the gap to meet increasing targets.” And, the company added that: “In the light of this assessment, Wastepack is refining its ideas about the minor changes it believes are needed to the PRN funding system in order to fill the gap.”
In the study, Bruce Bratley Associates calculates that in 2001 there appears to have been 4,195,308 tonnes of reprocessing capacity which represents a growth from 1998 to 2001 of 1,026,603 tonnes. This is sourced from official figures, although data for 2001 is extrapolated from figures for the first nine months of the year.
Deductions
Then, the consultants make a series of deductions to allow for specific cases where PRNs cannot be said to have increased growth. Wood (527,844 tonnes) is excluded because it was not obligated until 2000 and so cannot be used to compare like for like growth. Other deductions to be made include protocol tonnages for steel in mixed scrap and aluminium which do not represent any true increase in recycling. So, the report deducts 42,000 tonnes for steel export PRNs and 2,000 tonnes for aluminium. There is also a further 50,000 tonnes from Northern Ireland which was only added in in 2000.
This leaves a figure of a 404,759 tonnes increase. This reduces further when allowances are made for packaging growth and for the inclusion of energy from waste PRNs from Northern Ireland and the commissioning of new capacity in Dundee and Lerwick which was planned before 1998. More deductions see the removal of tonnage from new reprocessors and a deduction is made for local authority tonnage which is due to councils having to meet recycling targets rather than because of PRNs.
The balance tonnage remaining, after the four year's is an increase of 241,061, says the consultants. They calculate the expenditure on PRNs as 248 million which yields one new PRN for every 1,031 spent.
For a copy of the report, email info@brucebratley.co.uk.
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