The European Pathway to Zero Waste (EPOW), an EU Life+ funded partnership between the Environment Agency and WRAP that promotes the message of zero waste to landfill, has published a best practice guide containing advice for local authorities on preventing the illegal exportation of priority waste.
Written primarily for local authorities in the South East of England, the guide contains information on legislation that applies from the point of collection to treatment of waste, the constraints on exporting waste, good practice recommendations, and case studies provided by local authorities.
The report outlines that councils can take a number of steps to ‘prevent and mitigate’ the risks associated with illegal waste exporation, including:
- Being familiar with and understanding the controls that apply to waste exports;
- ensuring collection and recycling systems deliver clean materials free from ‘excessive’ contamination;
- taking an ‘active interest’ in the quality of recyclable materials from MRFcontractors and working to try and improve it;
- understanding the end destinations of recycled and rejected material;
- using audits to ensure contractors collect and retain information and evidence relating to how quality and rejects are managed.
Indeed, in order to encourage such behaviour, the guide outlines that the Environment Agency is changing the way it monitors permitted waste management sites during compliance visits, to specifically ‘seek evidence that operators understand what happens to waste materials after processing’.
The EA will also ‘increasingly expect operators to have environmental management systems (ISO: 14001 or equivalent) and quality management systems (ISO: 9001 or equivalent) in place that retain evidence of material inputs and outputs, audit the quality of material inputs and outputs, provide an audit trail of sub-contractors and identify and enable continual improvement’.
EPOW says that by helping to prevent illegal waste export, the guide will also help reduce the problems associated with the illegal activity, such as environmental damage (especially to countries that do not have the capacity to protect themselves against these risks), reputational risk to UK waste exporters and UK suppliers’ loss of valuable export opportunities.
Stakeholders such as the Environment Agency, local authorities and waste contractors in the South East of England, and the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management provided input and supported the creation of the guide.
A spokesperson from one waste collection authority commented: “I think it is a clear, easy to understand piece of guidance that outlines well what local authorities need to do in terms of tracking the materials they collect. I think much of this good practice should be used by local authorities regardless of whether the waste is being exported or not in order to provide transparency and accountability of all partners in the chain.”
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