Wales’s Minister for Natural Resources, Culture and Sport, John Griffiths, is calling on businesses and organisations to respond to Wales’s collection guidance consultation before it closes next week (21 July).
First launched in April by former Natural Resources Minister Alun Davies, the guidance aims to help councils and businesses understand what recycling services they are legally obligated to provide under waste law.
According to England and Wales’s transposition of the EU’s revised Waste Framework Directive (the Waste Regulations (Amendment) 2012), by 2015, every waste collection authority must have in place separate collections for waste paper, metal, plastic and glass when they are necessary to ‘facilitate or improve recovery’ and are ‘technically, environmentally and economically practicable’ (TEEP).
This change will affect English and Welsh councils as well as businesses that collect, transport and receive the four waste materials.
However, despite the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra) saying it would not be publishing any guidance on the matter (although the government-funded Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP) recently launched a non-statutory ‘route map’ for local authorities to help assess compliance with the regulations), Wales announced it would launch draft guidance on separate recycling collections to ‘offer clarity on the legal requirements for separate collections for local authorities and waste collection providers operating in Wales’.
It outlines that separating materials for recycling avoids contamination and ensures that they can be recycled to a higher standard.
However, the guidance highlights that although the regulations set separate collection as the default position, they ‘don’t prohibit the use of mixed or co-mingled collections of paper, metal, plastic and glass as long as it results in a similar quantity of high-quality recyclates, to that achievable by separate collection, or if separate collection isn’t technically, environmentally or economically practicable’.
As there is now just a week left to respond to the consultation, Griffiths has released this statement: ‘I want to encourage businesses and organisations that will be affected to give their views, to ensure the guidance can support them to plan ahead effectively.
‘I want it to be as simple as possible for everyone in Wales to recycle the four materials to a high quality, so we can continue to improve our recycling rates and continue to lead the way with recycling in the UK.
‘By collecting more high quality materials for recycling, Welsh councils and businesses can get a better price. This will help to grow Wales’s market for recycled materials, which can only benefit Welsh companies. This is why our overarching strategy, Towards Zero Waste, lays out a policy of separate collection for recyclable waste.’
Respond to the ‘Consultation on draft Statutory Guidance on Separate Collection of Waste Paper, Metal, Plastic and Glass’.
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How will the government and DMOs address the challenges of including glass in DRS while ensuring a level playing field across the UK?
There's no easy solution to include glass in the DRS while maintaining a level playing field. Potential approaches include a phased introduction of glass, potentially with higher deposits to reflect its logistical challenges. The government and DMOs could incentivise innovation in glass packaging design and subsidise dedicated return points for glass-handling. Exemptions for smaller businesses unable to handle glass might also be necessary. Any successful solution will likely blend several approaches. It must address the differing priorities of devolved administrations, balance environmental benefits with logistical and cost implications, and be supported by robust consumer education campaigns emphasizing the importance of glass recycling.