EU Policy and its impact on waste management in the UK

Dr. Nia Owen, Senior Consultant Waste Management & Resource Efficiency, AEA Recycling Council for Alberta 04/10/12 Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge, Jasper, Alberta

A world leading energy and climate change consultancy 1

A personal welcome

+ Dr Nia Owen

- Senior Consultant @ AEA for Waste Management & Resource Efficiency

- 8 years experience in the waste sector

- Former Policy Advisor in the Waste Regulation team at Environment Agency Wales

- Former Research Associate at Cardiff University: PhD in MRF design and performance

- Designed, commissioned and operated clean and dirty MRF

- Specialise in quality of recyclate, and waste reviews for the C&I sector

+ Acknowledgements

- AEA team ( my co-authors)

Adam Read, Maria Vinogradova & Chris Hoy

- My clients for allowing me to ‘share’ their experiences

- The organisers for the invite (again) 2

www.aeat.co.uk

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The Global Climate Change Consultancy

AEA delivers over £90 million annually of energy,

environmental, resource efficiency, transportation, and

climate policy support and program implementation

services to:

US Government

UK Government

European Commission

International Institutions

…. energy efficiency, clean energy, transport, GHG inventories, carbon management,

climate change strategies, adaptation, resource management, waste management,

sustainability, behaviour change …. 4

Our Scope of Services

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Practice Areas:

+ Emissions

+ Energy & Climate Change

+ Air & Water Quality

+ Sustainable Transport

+ Data & Knowledge Systems

+ Waste Management &

Resource Efficiency

Expertise:

• Energy/Emissions Modeling

• Effective Regulatory Frameworks

• Technologies / Cost / Barriers

• Policy Development

• Stakeholder Engagement

• Program Design & Implementation

• Knowledge Management & Transfer

…. experience at the interface of government, business, and academia

Joined up service delivery…..

Public or Private Sector Decision Support & Solutions Delivery

Compliance, Cost Savings, & Environmental improvements 6

Development of EU Policy

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EU Waste Framework Directive

+ Dates back to the 1970s

+ Enshrining of waste hierarchy within the WFD

+ Transferred to national law by each member state

+ Commingled recycling

- Counts towards the "separate" collections of material required by the revised WFD after 2015

+ Target of 50% for household waste to be collected for recycling and reuse by 2020

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Prevention

Preparing for reuse

Recycling

Other recovery

Disposal

Landfill Directive

+ Scaling back of organic material to landfills compared to 1995 …

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The EU Landfill Directive

+ EU Landfill Directive – address landfill’s environmental impacts

- BMW reductions required to mitigate fugitive CH4 emissions

- Pre-treatment of landfilled materials

- Landfill waste acceptance criteria (WACs)

- Landfill design, operation, completion and closure requirements

+ BMW Landfill targets for the UK

- 75% of 1995 level by 2010

- 50% of 1995 level by 2013

- 35% of 1995 level by 2020

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The predicted ‘need for change’ …

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Non-biodegradable

Municipal Waste

Biodegradable Municipal Waste

Requiring Diversion

Biodegradable Municipal

Waste Allowed to Landfill

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What does this mean?

+ This now includes C&I wastes…..

- A major shift in how the UK defines MSW!!!!

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Implementation of EU Policy & national waste strategy development

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UK Government

+ UK is responsible for reporting to EU on policy progress

+ National Administrations set policy and monitor performance

- England

- Scotland

- Wales

- Northern Ireland

+ Local Government set strategy, deliver services and respond to local ‘demands’

- Funded by UK taxation

- Funded by local Council tax

- Elected ‘members’ 14

Implementation … nationally …

+ Waste Strategy for England 2007

- Waste Review 2011 (some minor revisions in priorities)

+ Scotland Zero Waste Plan 2010

+ Wales Towards Zero Waste strategy 2010

+ Northern Ireland Waste Strategy 2006 (now under review)

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“Strategy wars”

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County Policy/

Strategy Year Recycling Landfill Incineration

England

Government Review of

Waste Policy in England) Waste

Strategy for England

(2011) 2007

50% by 2020 35% of 1995

levels by 2020 (biodegradable)

Scotland Zero Waste

Plan 2010 70% by 2025

Maximum 5% by 2025

Wales Towards Zero

Waste 2010 70% by 2025

Maximum 5% by 2025

Maximum 30% high efficiency EfW by 2025

Northern Ireland

Towards Resource

Management 2006

50% by 2020 (HHW), 60% by

2020 (C&IW)

35% of 1995 levels by 2020

(biodegradable)

Levels of ambition

England Scotland Wales

Targets beyond EU Landfill and Waste Framework Directives

Restrictions on waste managed through incineration i.e. not just landfill substitution

Enforced source segregation of food waste

Landfill ban considerations / /

Individual authority targets and guidelines on collection systems

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Divergence

+ Wales and Scotland are clearly leading in terms of waste strategy

- Clear centralised leadership

- High priority

- Ambitious targets beyond statutory EU limits

+ Wales and Scotland have fully embraced Zero Waste as a policy concept

- Used as a philosophy to drive change

- Towards Zero Waste

- One Planet Living (Wales) 18

Performance across the EU

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Waste treatment in the EU

20 http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/ITY_OFFPUB/KS-SF-11-031/EN/KS-SF-11-031-EN.PDF

What about the UK?

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Waste arisings – 2010/11 (mT/yr)

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Waste Type Scotland Wales Northern

Ireland

England

Municipal 3.14 1.63 0.94 26.3

Household 2.82 1.39 0.83 23.3

C&I* 6.5 3.6 1.3 48.0

C&D* 7.6 12.2 1.7 77.4

+ MSW Recycling & Composting rate

- Scotland: 38%

- Wales: 46%

- Northern Ireland: 34%

- England: 40%

How has this been achieved?

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Disposal

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UK Landfill Tax Escalator

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Standard

InertAverage Landfill

Gate Fee = £20/t

Average Landfill

Gate Fee = £50/t

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When the ‘cost’

started to bite!

Meeting landfill directive targets

+ Driven by the LAS & LATS regime

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Country Year

2010 2013 2020

Wales Targets 710,000 470,000 330,000

Performance 523,035

% of allowance used 74%

England Targets 11,200,000 7,460,000 5,220,000

Performance 8,400,000

% of allowance used 75%

Scotland Targets 2,697,000 1,798,000 1,258,000

Performance 1,405,889

% of allowance used 52%

Northern Ireland Targets 470,000 320,000 220,000

Performance 383,329

% of allowance used 82%

% reduction in MSW sent to landfill

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England

Scotland

Wales

Future

+ Wales:

- 5% cap on the proportion of waste that can be landfilled by 2025.

- Considering landfill bans for wood, metal, glass, plastic and food waste

+ Scotland:

- 5% cap on the proportion of waste that can be landfilled by 2025.

- landfilling biodegradable municipal material from 2020

- landfilling separately collected dry recyclables and food waste from 2013 in order to ensure that materials collected for recycling remain available for recycling.

+ England:

- Currently consulting on a landfill ban for waste wood

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Energy from Waste

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Current trends

+ Very much developing in the UK

+ Public perception of these facilities are an issue

+ Public engagement and awareness is key

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Future & Key issues

+ Wales:

- High efficiency energy from waste plants - combustion facilities operating in ‘heat only’ or combined heat and power (CHP) modes, and pyrolysis/gasification options operating in CHP modes

- Maximum of 30% of local authority collected municipal waste sent to high efficiency energy from waste by 2024/25.

+ Scotland:

- High efficiency energy from waste plants needed to process residual waste.

- Remove key recyclables (plastics and metals) from mixed waste prior to incineration (from 1 July 2012)

- Ban on materials collected separately for recycling going to landfill or incineration (end of 2013)

+ Key issues to address:

- Outlet for heat is critical to achieve high efficiency 31

Recycling, composting & AD

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Collection types used

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England Wales Scotland UK

Kerbside sort 42% 50% 47% 42%

Co-mingled 43% 27% 34% 44%

Co-mingled plus textiles 2% 0% 0% 2%

Two stream 19% 23% 31% 19%

Two stream plus textiles 4% 5% 3% 4%

Other 2% 9% 6% 2%

Single material 2% 0% 19% 3%

No scheme 0% 0% 3% 0%

The rise of Alternate Weekly Collection

+ The fortnightly collection of residual waste supported by any combination of comprehensive recycling services

- Typically, involves the collection of residual waste on week 1 and recyclables and/or organics on week 2

- Some schemes operate with a weekly collection of dry recyclables / food waste with residual waste collected fortnightly

+ Why change?

- To achieve higher recycling rates and thereby meet statutory targets at a lower overall cost

- To encourage participation in existing / enhanced recycling services

- An opportunity to review all existing collection services and to develop an integrated approach

- As a means of achieving operational efficiencies

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Higher recycling…how is this achieved?

+ Restriction of residual waste capacity through use of wheeled bins (with enforced policies) or collection of limited number of sacks

- Makes use of recycling boxes more likely (90% participation)

+ Enhancement of recycling services

- Increased dry materials;

- Introduction of food and / or garden waste collections

+ Savings made by reducing refuse collection

- Reinvested into recycling services

+ Impacts

- Daventry District Council – increase in tonnage collected through ‘red & blue box scheme’ of 45%

- Somerset Waste Partnership – increase in tonnage collected through dry recycling service of 50%

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Not always popular ….

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Introduction of

alternative-weekly

collections

Rigorous enforcement

of side-waste at

Hyndburn Borough

Council

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Lunacy they cry!

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Government policy on collections

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England • Help local communities develop fit for purpose local solutions for

collecting and dealing with household waste and work with

councils to meet households’ reasonable expectations for weekly

collections, particularly of smelly waste

Scotland • Separate collections of specific waste types, including food, to

avoid contaminating other materials, increasing reuse and

recycling opportunities and contributing to renewable energy

targets

Wales • 80% of the target for municipal waste recycling must be through

source separated collections - as opposed to the sorting of mixed

waste

+ Judicial review – uncertainty for the sector.

+ Shift to source segregated collections likely – particularly in Wales and Scotland.

Quality …

+ Is about consistently delivering materials to the marketplace that are

- effectively separated to meet customer requirements

- compliant with national regulations and policies….

- at a cost that is acceptable

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Out of Spec input stream….

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Since 2010 things have changed …

+ Increasing concerns about quality from the end markets

+ Less guarantees from Chinese & Indian reprocessors

+ Returned loads from Indonesia and Brazil

+ EA has clamped down on ‘waste’ exports

+ UK and EU reprocessors continually setting the ‘bar’ higher in terms of quality and consistency

+ Needs additional investment at MRF

+ Now looking at evolution of service provision …

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Pushing up quality ….

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Organic waste collections

+ c. 3.9mt of food & garden waste was collected by LA’s during 2007/08

- Garden waste: 1.8mt from CA sites & 1.4mt from kerbside

- Food and garden waste: 435kt from kerbside

- Food waste (source-segregated): 14kt

+ The number of local authorities collecting food waste grew by 44% between 2008 and 2009 alone!

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5 6 10 15 20 36 58

78 80 95 137

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Food waste collections

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Over 1/3 of all LAs offer a segregated collection (or one

commingled with green waste)

Bins & Caddies

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Liners … costly to distribute!

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Helping the residents ….

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Addressing mis-conceptions

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Enforcement

+ Critical to control contamination …

+ Would your political leaders support this?

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HWRCs

+ Offer services for residents to take their waste and recycling to centralised facility

+ Best sites are achieving >80% re-use, recycling & composting.

+ Often partner with the third sector to recycle more niche materials – carpets, mattresses

+ Re-use is becoming increasingly popular at these sites – on-site stores – furniture & electronics.

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C&I wastes

+ Local authorities increasingly offering services to the sector.

+ Drivers for diversion – landfill tax

+ Support provided to the sector by WRAP & ZWS:

- Waste audit/ reviews

- Grant support

+ Scotland – Waste (Scotland) Regulations 2012:

- Requirement for businesses to segregate dry recyclables and food waste for collection

- Macerator ban for non-domestic usage – avoid diverting food waste from landfill to sewer.

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Re-use

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Re-use

+ Key management option for bulky waste

- white goods, furniture, mattresses etc

+ Collected at kerbside or at HWRCs

- Charges often used for kerbside collection

+ Area of increasing focus – partnerships with the voluntary sector to deliver these are increasing.

+ Independent mechanism: Freecycle, eBay, Gumtree etc.

+ Not just about municipal waste streams – increasing focus in the other sectors too…

- Online exchange for surplus construction materials

- Surplus Centre for building materials

+ PAS141 standard provides protocols for the minimum tests and processes required – increasing consumer confidence.

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Performance

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Future

+ We need to make significant improvements in this area..

+ Re-use is not well understood by the public – communications generally been focused on recycling..

+ Future changes – increased third sector involvement, and development of HWRCs to facilitate re-use, including on-site shops for the sale of material

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Waste prevention

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Waste prevention plans

+ rWFD requires all member states to develop waste prevention plans

+ Scotland currently consulting on its plan ‘Safeguarding Scotland’s Resources’ which proposes a waste reduction target of 5% by 2014 and 15% by 2025. Actions proposed to achieve this:

- voluntary agreements with business;

- zero waste pledge system;

- promotion of site waste management plans; and

- voluntary agreement with the waste management industry in order to help the industry help its customer to reduce waste and recycle more.

+ Wales aims to reduce waste by 1.5% per annum of the 2007 baseline across all sectors by 2050. Waste prevention plan expected by December 2013

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Love Food, Hate Waste Campaign

+ Aims to raise awareness of the need to reduce food waste and help us take action.

+ Funded by WRAP and operates across the UK.

+ www.lovefoodhatewaste.com

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Voluntary agreements

+ Courtauld Commitment was launched in 2005 – aims to improve resource efficiency of the grocery retail sector across the UK. There are 50 signatories to this, and the targets are:

- reduce the carbon impact of grocery packaging by 10% by reducing the weight, increasing recycling rate and increasing recycled content of all grocery packaging;

- reduce UK household food and drink waste by 4%; and

- reduce traditional grocery product and packaging waste in the grocery supply chain by 5% (including both liquid and solid wastes).

+ HaFS Agreement was launched by WRAP in June 2012 and applies across the UK. Aims to drive the sector to reduce waste and recycling more. The targets are to:

- reduce food and associated packaging waste arising by 5% from 2012 levels by the end of 2015 (measured using CO2e emissions); and

- increase food and packaging waste being recycled, sent to AD/ composting, to a minimum of 70% by the end of 2015.

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Voluntary agreements

+ Business Recycling and Waste Services Commitment - help local authorities improve business customers’ satisfaction with their waste and recycling collections to increase recycling rates

+ Responsibility deal launched by Defra and ESA - aims to help C&I waste producers adopt more sustainable waste management practices.

- Waste management companies that sign up to the voluntary deal, will be expected to provide advice and support to their customers to deal with their waste higher up the waste hierarchy, and increase the quality of materials collected and processed.

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C&D sector

+ Site waste management plans used to drive improvements in waste management and resource efficiency in the sector

+ encourage the effective management of materials and ensure waste is considered at all stages of a project - from design through to completion

+ www.wrap.org.uk/content/site-waste-management-plans-1

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Next steps

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Changing UK landscape

+ UK progress has been forced

- EU Landfill Directive

- Increasing energy prices and decreasing landfill void

- Public demand

+ Government has set ‘statutory targets since 2000

+ Major success factor has been the Landfill Tax

+ Government policy has become aligned in the last 2 years

+ Best practice exists, but each authority makes it’s own decision!

+ Rapid recycling expansion has plateaued – we have covered all the low hanging fruit

- Focus is now on hard to reach groups, high rise, difficult materials (mixed plastics etc.)

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Increasing focus on C&I wastes …

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Opportunities with C&I wastes

+ Commercial waste

- 69% of LAs with collection responsibility offer a residual waste collection to businesses

- 44% offer a recycling collection

- Increase can utilise existing infrastructure but will require investment

+ Revenue from recyclate

- Currently at best a 50/50 income split with waste company

- Scope for increase, but increased risk

+ Economies of scale

- Shared service between district councils

- Integrated service across a county (collection and disposal) e.g. Somerset, Dorset

- Integration across multiple counties e.g. South East 7 (led by Kent)

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New WRAP guidance

+ Focused on how sites can be developed by a range of parties to target C&I recyclables

- Developed by AEA

+ Headlines include …..

- Successful schemes in operation

- Charging systems can work

- Awareness raising and engagement are key

- Target the right materials makes sense

- Learn from the mistakes of others …. 67

Change ….

Local Authorities must embrace C&I wastes and look at how their services (kerbside, bring, HWRC) can be improved to deliver ….

working in partnership with private, public & charity organisations 68

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Good Morning!

AEA Nia Owen

Senior Consultant

AEA

The Gemini Building

Fermi Avenue

Harwell Oxford

Didcot OX11 0QR

Tel: +44 (0)870 190 6562

Mob: +44 (0)7875 586623

E: nia.owen@aeat.co.uk

W: www.aeat.co.uk

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