The Environment Agency (EA) has launched a new online tool to help businesses comply with end-of-waste criteria for products.

Developed by environmental consultancy Ricardo-AEA, the Quality Protocol Checker (QP Checker) is an online tool that supports the EA’s end-of-waste criteria for the production and use of a product from a specific waste type (known as Quality Protocols).

Only by complying with the criteria in the protocols can businesses prove that a waste material has been fully recovered and can be classed as a ‘product’. Without achieving compliance with a relevant QP, businesses are bound to manage the waste under waste management controls.

QP Checker details

Designed as part of the EA’s EQual programme (which aims to encourage businesses to use ‘more and better waste-derived material in new products’ to ‘make the best use of resources’), the new QP Checker aims to provide an ‘easy, quick and cost effective way for both new and existing producers to check that they meet the QP quality requirements and any other underpinning specifications’.

It is hoped the tool will support an ‘automated and robust submissions process while reducing the administrative burden on industry and the EA in preparing and evaluating submissions’.

The QP Checker, currently only available for compost and recycled aggregates, works by creating a user report that documents performance and pinpoints any areas where improvement is needed. It can also be used as an internal audit check and will support a ‘more robust and consistent’ compliance regime.

Developed in ‘close co-operation with a wide range of industry partners and stakeholders’, the web tool is free to use, and all data remains confidential to the user.

While the QP Checker is currently only available for compost and recycled aggregates, there is currently work underway to develop a checker for the digestate from anaerobic digestion.

In the meantime, it is hoped that businesses can use the tool as a template for other waste streams.

‘Supporting better understanding, decision-making and compliance’

Speaking of the web tool, Ricardo-AEA Technical Director Phil White said: “The production of safe and fit-for-purpose waste-derived products offers significant benefits, including reduced use of virgin raw materials leading to reduced cost and environmental impacts throughout the supply chain.

“However, if these products remain classified as waste this potentially stigmatises them, restricting market development. This is a complicated area of legislation, and we are pleased to be part of this programme to facilitate and support better understanding, decision-making and compliance.”

Roger Hoare, Environment & Business Manager at the Environment Agency, added: “High-quality waste-derived products not only benefit the environment through improved resource efficiency, they also benefit producers’ bottom line through improved profit margins.

“By supporting producers who opt for QP compliance, we hope to encourage market growth and end-user confidence. The EQual programme is also helping regulators to promote greater resource efficiency by supporting a clear and consistent regulatory framework to assist with wider end-of-waste decision making and compliance assessment.”

The tool has been welcomed by members of the composting and recycled aggregates sectors, with John Bradshaw-Bullock, Technical Adviser to the Mineral Products Association’s Aggregates, Asphalt and Slag Product Groups, saying: “This easy-to-use tool readily identifies whether the recycling operation is sufficient to ensure that the aggregate has achieved end of waste and has therefore been legitimately removed from the waste steam. It is important to ensure that recycled aggregates gain maximum credibility and use within the market and this tool facilitates that process.”

According to the EA, the QPs have, to date, resulted in an estimated 21 million tonnes of materials being diverted from landfill, saving around 40 million tonnes of virgin raw materials and approximately 130 thousand tonnes of carbon.

The QP Checker web tool was first previewed at RWM in partnership with CIWM in September 2013.

Find out more about the QP Checker web tool or read more about the EQual programme.