Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have welcomed the legislative proposals and action plan included in the Circular Economy Package released yesterday, but have expressed disappointment in the reduced recycling targets.

The package set a 2030 municipal waste recycling target of 65 per cent, five per cent lower than the figure included in a draft proposal released in 2014.

Also included in the package were targets for packaging waste recycling (75 per cent by 2030, again reduced from last year) and landfill (a maximum of 10 per cent of all waste by 2030, a proposal new to this package).

MEPs seeking alterations

Last year’s draft proposal, released in July 2014 by then-Environment Commissioner Janez Potočnik, featured a headline recycling target of 70 per cent by 2030, as well as packaging waste targets and a ban on landfilling recyclable materials and biodegradable waste by 2025.

This proposal was then withdrawn last December to make way for a ‘broader and more ambitious approach’, which was announced yesterday after a year of development. The reduced targets, and lack of concrete legislative action on food waste and resource efficiency, led to stakeholder disappointment, including calling the delay ‘a wasted year’.

During the package’s development, MEPs strongly backed a resolution to include the original 70 per cent municipal waste recycling target for 2030 in the package. Also agreed in a July vote was an 80 per cent packaging waste recycling target, a strict limit on the incineration of recyclable and biodegradable waste by 2020, a ban on landfilling by 2030 and resource-efficiency targets.

As well as presenting the package to the public for the first time yesterday, the European Commission also passed it on to the European Parliament.

The Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament (S&D), the second largest group with 190 MEPs, including the 20 UK-based MEPs from the Labour Party, has already stated that its members will push for the targets to be amended to reflect those in the previously agreed resolution.

The package will also be presented to the European Council on 16 December. Both institutions must approve the package, though no clear timeline can be given for how long this process will take.

Package ‘falls short of challenge ahead’

Sirpa Pietikäinen, the MEP who led the July resolution, said yesterday that while there are positive elements, the revised package ‘falls short of the challenge ahead’. The biggest shortcoming, she says, is the lack of tangible targets: “The European Parliament asked for a clear 30 per cent resource efficiency target by 2030. The problem with the lack of a clear target, or setting targets too low is that we risk locking ourselves in misguided and suboptimal investments and end up losing a lot of money.

“In new buildings but especially in renovated ones, the aim should be zero energy buildings. Major renovations do not take place every year. This is why ambitious targets are important, because we are stuck with buildings built today up until the next 50 years.

“All in all, the package is very waste-concentrated when the focus should be on the whole product cycle from design onwards.

“This is why a lot depends on how we can use the tools offered to us by the Ecodesign Directive, which is a centre piece of legislation in this respect.”

Ambition needs supporting targets

S&D disagreed with Pietikäinen, saying that the rethought package was ‘comprehensive and multi-disciplinary’ and commended its ‘ambitious vision’, but questioned whether the few targets included lived up to the rest of the package.

S&D Vice-President for Sustainability, Kathleen Van Brempt, said: “We are glad that the commission has taken on board many of the recommendations we made… such as a broader concept of eco-design. It should go beyond energy and include durability, reparability and recyclability. So, it is very positive that the commission wants to set up an independent testing programme to detect defeating devices or design.

“However, this ambitious roadmap needs to be supported by specific targets, and our political group will try to build a consensus in the [European] Parliament to introduce those targets to make sure that the roadmap is accomplished.”

S&D MEP Simona Bonafè, responsible of the waste package in the European Parliament, added: “If the whole package creates a really ambitious framework towards a circular economy, we cannot say the same about targets fixed in the new waste package.

“We also think that the 65 per cent target for recycling of municipal waste by 2030 is not enough. The proposal that was initially discussed already with the Barroso Commission back in 2014 set the goal to 70 per cent and this is the minimum we will call for in the Parliament. It also lacks a concrete marine litter reduction target and a food waste reduction target; these are not environmental issues, but ethical ones.

“Having a mandatory target for landfilling and extended producer responsibility (EPR) minimum requirements are very good starting points. The S&D Group is looking forward to the discussions in the Parliament and with the [European] Council to further elaborate on these points by enlarging the extended producer responsibility (EPR) schemes to other product categories and setting up the new strategy on plastics with new instruments such as bio and recycled content standards to boost the demand on high-quality secondary and bio-based raw materials.”

The European People’s Party (EPP), the largest group in the European Parliament with 216 MEPs, released a short statement welcoming the package but questioning the year’s delay. Karl-Heinz Florenz MEP, Member of the Environment Committee, said: “One could ask the question: much ado about nothing?”

The Greens/European Free Alliance (EFA), which has 50 MEPs, also expressed disappointment with the delay and the lowered ambition.

Greens/EFA Vice-president and environment spokesperson Bas Eickhout said: “While we welcome the fact the commission has finally come forward with revised proposals on the circular economy, we are concerned that the plans are undermined by the lowered ambition. This is contrary to the commitment by the commission to come forward with a more ambitious proposal. A year on from the initial decision by the commission to withdraw its original proposals, we have lost both time and ambition in the push to stimulate the circular economy at EU level.

“While the new proposal includes additional elements, it lacks crucial aspects from the withdrawn proposal. A glaring absence is the scrapping of the proposed target to increase resource efficiency at EU level by 30 per cent by 2030 compared with 2014 levels. Without effective and binding measures to reduce resource consumption, and without integration of resource consumption into the European Semester, the package will not truly contribute to sustainable development.”

Responses to the Circular Economy Package from members of the waste and resources industry is available in Resource’s article.