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All businesses in Scotland now have a legal responsibility to separate recyclables including paper, plastic, card, metal and glass. The Waste (Scotland) Regulations, which came into force on 1 January, also require food businesses in urban areas producing more than 50kg per week of food waste to implement food recycling schemes. The move will support…
The UK retail industry has signed up to a range of ambitious targets for reducing its impact on the environment, including pledging to send less than one percent of waste to landfill by 2020. Commitments announced at a recent launch event also include a collective pledge to reduce absolute carbon emissions by 25 percent by…
Legal fears are believed to have been behind Defra’s decision to abandon guidance for councils over municipal waste collections, commingling and TEEP. This is despite the government reassuring councils that guidance was being drawn up by the government last summer Last June resource minister Lord de Mauley had reassured councils that guidance was being drawn…
Concerns have been raised that the lack of certainty on landfill tax after 2015/16 in the December 5 Autumn Statement may jeopardise future green growth and investment in the waste sector. George Osborne’s Statement was met with disappointment in the waste management industry as it included no mention of landfill tax, which is set to…
Almost as worrying as the practice of illegally exporting WEEE is a feeling that we are starting to become desensitised to it. Maybe we feel it is inevitable – just another inconvenient truth? I hope and still believe that this isn’t the case. This belief is based on the sound environmental, economic and commercial reasons…
New research from WRAP shows that there is considerable consumer interest in resource efficient business models, which contribute to a circular economy by keeping products in circulation for longer. Consumers have a strong preference for buying and owning new products. However, research from WRAP found that there is a “strong appetite” for repair and rental…
Newly appointed resource minister Dan Rogerson has written to members of the waste and recycling sector to inform them of a ‘reduction of activities’ in the area for 2014/15. In the letter Mr Rogerson wrote that waste is ‘one of his priorities’ but added that from next year, the Department will focus on ‘essential’ areas…
There was a ‘continued improvement’ in compliance with environmental permits at sites regulated by the Environment Agency in 2012, according to a report. Permits are issued to businesses to ensure that releases from a site to air, land and water do not cause pollution or harm. Compliance of sites is assessed by the Agency through…
Consumer goods giant Unilever and retailer Tesco have called for a more ‘joined-up approach’ across the supply chain in order to tackle food waste in the UK. Speaking at WRAP’s annual conference in London last week (November 7), Amanda Sourry, UK and Ireland chair at Unilever, said that “fractured” offerings of waste services across the…
A Darlington-based skip hire firm and four directors and employees have been convicted of multiple waste crimes, following a 10-week trial at Teesside Crown Court. Albert Skip Hire Ltd, manager Raymond Anthony Stewart and his brother company director Paul Stuart Shepherd were convicted on Friday (November 8), following an investigation by the Environment Agency. Raymond,…
