Lighting-based compliance scheme Recolight has written to local authorities to confirm that they can dispose of waste lamps from commercial sources in Recolight containers, a change that it says could result in significant cost savings.
Recolight is a Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) compliance scheme for the lighting industry, providing a comprehensive free lamp collection and recycling service. Since its founding in 2007, Recolight has funded the recycling of over 254 million lamps, LEDs and luminaires.
The company currently collects waste lamps from a large proportion of the UK’s household waste recycling centres (HWRCs) and says that under a new classification councils can include WEEE from commercial sources in the collections for free, rather than paying for commercial waste lamp collections.
This change has been made possible following the implementation of ‘dual use’ classification, which means that WEEE from commercial sources that is similar to WEEE from consumers is now classified as ‘Household WEEE’.
The definition of household and non-household WEEE was amended and guidelines came into effect in January 2016, after the UK’s definition of household and non-household WEEE was found to be at odds with that held by the European Commission.
New government guidance now confirms that gas discharge, LED and sodium lamps are all to be classified as household, meaning all such lamps can be placed in Recolight containers on local authority HWRC sites.
The only waste lamps that cannot be deposited in the Recolight containers are those classified as business lamps. Examples in the government guidance are stadium lighting, and cinema projection lamps.
Recolight Chief Executive Nigel Harvey said: “We are pleased to be able to offer local authorities the chance to save money in this way. The dual use decision was an appropriate move by government, and our announcement is a logical extension of that decision.
“This change also means our containers are used more efficiently. If they fill up faster, then the same container is yielding greater collection tonnages.”
Commenting on the initial dual use amendment, he said: ‘’Dual use will result in a more balanced system in the UK, with more producers taking responsibility for their market share of recycling. That seems eminently fair.”
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