The European Council yesterday (6 May) adopted a regulation amending Regulation (EC) No 1013/2006 on shipments of waste.

The EU’s Waste Shipment Regulation (WSR) – amendments to which were first proposed last summer – currently bans all exports of hazardous waste to countries outside of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and all exports of waste for disposal outside the EU.

However, the EC says that around 25 per cent of waste shipments sent from the EU to developing countries contravene international regulations. The countries that receive these illegal shipments often lack the infrastructure needed to process waste effectively. As such, waste (especially hazardous waste) is often dumped or mismanaged, ‘causing serious negative impacts on human health and the environment’.

To counter this, last summer the EC proposed amendments to the WSR to ensure all member states follow stringent inspection procedures.

At a meeting of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council yesterday, members (excepting the Austrian delegation, which abstained) voted to adopt the new regulations.

Regulation details

Specifically, the amended regulation requires member states to:

• set out their priorities in annual inspection plans, the first of which is to be adopted by 1 January 2017;
• carry out risk assessment for specific waste streams and sources of illegal shipments;
• identify whether waste shipments are covered by the regulation;
• clarify if waste has been correctly classified;
• identify if waste is being shipped to ‘environmentally-sound facilities’;
• give inspectors more power to demand evidence from suspected illegal waste exporters; and
• include a minimum number of physical checks in waste shipment inspections;
• make information on check findings available to the public,including electronically, on an annual basis; and
• give inspectors more powers.

According to the law, inspection plans must include the following elements:

• the objectives and priorities of the inspections, including a description of how those priorities have been identified;
• the geographical area covered by that inspection plan;
• information on planned inspections, including on physical checks;
• the tasks assigned to each authority involved in inspections;
• arrangements for cooperation between authorities involved in inspections;
• information on the training of inspectors on matters relating to inspections; and
• information on the human, financial and other resources for the implementation of that inspection plan.

All inspection plans must reviewed ‘at least every three years and, where appropriate, updated’. The review is meant to ‘evaluate to which extent the objectives and other elements of that inspection plan have been implemented’.

New rules have been made ‘in the best interest of legal waste operators’

Speaking of the regulation last month, rapporteur and Green MEP Bart Staes said: “EU member states have been dragging their feet on implementing EU rules on waste shipments, with 25 per cent of waste shipments contravening these rules on average. The new law will ensure that member states are obliged to make comprehensive and meaningful inspection plans to check waste shipments, with a minimum number of physical checks in line with the risk of illegal shipments. These inspection plans will also be accessible to the public, as MEPs insisted.

“Enforcement will be stepped up, with more powers for authorities involved in inspections to check shipments. Cooperation between member states will be significantly strengthened.”

Staes added that as well as helping to tackle the environmental impacts of illegal waste shipments, the rules will also be in the “best interest of legal waste operators”.

He said: “At a time of rising production costs, waste should be considered as a valuable resource and recycling should be prioritised in an effort to promote a more sustainable European economy.”

The regulation will enter into force 20 days after its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union and will apply from 1 January 2016.

The commission says it will review the regulation ‘by 2020’.

Read the amended regulations, or find out more about the problem of illegal waste shipments in Resource 73.