Andrew Bird, Chair of the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC), considers whether harmonisation in recycling collections is really the way forward.

The UK’s total household waste recycling rate rose to 44.9 per cent in 2014, up from 44.1 per cent in 2013, according to official statistics released today (15 December) by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs.

A voluntary framework for consistent recycling systems across Scotland has today been announced by the Scottish Government and Convention of Scottish Local Authorities.

The National Assembly of Wales will debate tomorrow on the possibility of a deposit-return scheme, weeks after the Welsh Conservatives announced that a Conservative government would introduce a pilot system.

Northern Irish councils could save up to £4 million while boosting the country’s economy through universal adoption of a stacked recycling box system, says Bryson Recycling.

A round-up of news from the waste and resources sector, including a new Novelis plant, recycling benefitting London Zoo and a new glass recycling contract in Scotland.

Powys will become the second local authority in Wales to implement three-weekly kerbside residual waste collections when the new system begins next Monday.

CIWM has criticised Defra’s responses to the European Commission’s Circular Economy Package consultation, saying they highlight ‘Whitehall’s ambivalent attitude to green growth’.

The number of obligated material recovery facilities (MRFs) supplying quarterly details of their activities is still not improving, three reporting periods into the regulations requiring them to do so.

Following the publication of Quarter 3 data showing a drop in recycling figures from last year, plastic recycling organisation RECOUP has called for changes to the PRN system.