Environmental News
THE GARBAGE GURU – January 2009
TIP 1. Advertise and Capitalise
Advertising is now ‘cheap as chips’! You can haggle like you’re in a Morroccan Bazaar!!! Get full page ads in the Yellow Pages at half the usual rates and ‘beef up’ your web site, making sure your skip company is marketed to its full potential. This way, you’ll be ready for the boom in demand next spring when the property market will take off again… In other words, b****cks to the sceptics and their doom mongering!
TIP 2. Develop Your Existing Employees
That was the message at the launch of a new Diploma programme at the University of Huddersfield.
The new course is practical, flexible and concentrates on the waste and recycling sector, with modules being delivered by industry experts. It provides individuals with a cost-effective package of technical skills and knowledge to enhance business performance, productivity and also motivate staff.
The Diploma is aimed at supervisors and managers already working in the sector along with new entrants who have a background in transport, construction or sales. With a strong focus on practical work-based learning, learners can apply their knowledge to the real world.
For more information on the Diploma, or to discuss your specific requirements, call Mike Hibbert, University of Huddersfield, on: (01484) 472973, email M.Hibbert@hud.ac.uk or theguru@theskip.net
January 12, 2009 at 4:39 pm | Environmental News, Garbage Guru | No comment
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DUTY OF SCARE!
Just when you thought it was safe to pick up that skip, along comes yet another change in the legislation which is badged as an additional effort to tackle waste crime. Yes, more red tape, which at first reading will not have much effect on illegal activities, which continue in spite of all current systems of licensing and registration. Fly tippers and operators involved in serious offences do not normally follow the paperwork trail that reputable operators are burdened with.
There is mounting evidence that the landfill tax is a contributing factor as our legislative drive to reduce waste going to landfill conflicts with its aims and objectives. Prohibiting waste from landfill is a sensible aim but we need somewhere for the segregated wastes that cannot be recycled, especially inert wastes and fines, to be deposited. This problem is significant for all waste operations and is regularly reported in the numerous journals, including The Skip. The ENDS Report May 2008 edition again noted several landfill avoidance prosecutions, such as depositing non-inert fines from a transfer operation to inert only exempt sites, fly tipping construction and demolition wastes and operating ‘exempt’ sites illegally.
One operation reported on the Environment Agency’s web site on 11 June 2008 was successfully prosecuted with the two defendants receiving custodial sentences of 14 and 22 months. The case is worth noting (http:www.environment-agency.gov.uk/news/2062931) as the defendants went to great lengths to appear legitimate, which has implications for carriers using such sites. How do you know the site you are using has a valid exemption? Traditionally, obtaining a copy of someone’s licence or exemption is sufficient proof that they have an approved operation. Not so anymore! Even if a site does have a licence or exemption the Agency are now chasing carriers that have legitimately used sites that have later been found to be non-compliant. How far should duty of care checks go? Should we be doing the Agency’s job for them? The simple answer is a resounding NO! Most waste operators are not qualified to audit waste sites and it is the job of the regulator that charges for the issue of permits and exemptions to do that job. Come on Defra, if you want to reduce so called environmental crime put some more resources into tackling it where it is most needed – i.e. on the ground.
The current system of using landfill or increasingly rare Paragraph 9 and 19 exemptions has to be addressed before any serious review of carrier registration or the duty of care takes place. The exemption review is well underway and I hope that Defra take on board the industry’s comments and also take a proportionate approach on inert landfill which would reduce the over reliance on exemptions that often stretch the boundaries of the legislation.
Now that rant is out of the way I shall concentrate on the title subject at hand. On 13 June 2008 Defra announced its second consultation on the controls on the handling, transfer and transport of waste, in the form of The Waste Controls (England and Wales) Regulations 2009 which if all goes according to plan will come into force in April 2009. The previous consultation closed on 6 march 2007 and the current one concentrates and consolidates the responses from the first one. The proposed regulations are the first major review of the Duty of Care and Carrier Registration since it came in to force over 16 years ago. Precisely what effect it will have on the legitimate waste industry is debatable as the main focus is on illegal operators, thereby increasing costs for the legitimate ones.
I shall concentrate on the effect on carriers this month and look at the duty of care in detail next month. The new regulations themselves are not very detailed and much will be left to guidance, which can be revised more easily than the legislation. The main proposals discussed are as follows:
1. Revoke existing regulations for carrier registration and the duty of care.
2. Impose a new duty for the Agency to make periodic inspections of all registered carriers of, and dealers and brokers in controlled waste.
3. Registration will be for one year rather than three, with various options proposed for renewal, such as a ‘tax disc’ based system which could be renewed easily and displayed on each vehicle. This will be an additional burden for larger waste operators with many vehicles or service companies with hundreds of vans but would enable carrier registrations to be checked instantly. The discs will be non-transferable i.e. new vehicle = new disc (at a cost of <£5 each).
4 Splitting carriers into lower and upper tiers, with the cost of registration for lower tier carriers (charities, farmers, waste producers etc.) at a one off £30 charge. Most waste carriers will face a £60 application fee and annual renewal of £45, which is not significantly greater but the process must be robust enough to ensure registrations do not accidentally lapse, which is addressed in the consultation document.
5. Waste producers may also have to register if they carry their own waste normally and regularly, although no detailed definitions of ‘normally and regularly’ have been proposed.
6. Change to revocation powers to enable more prosecutions to be taken into account when revoking a carrier’s registration. The increase in the list of prescribed offences could be done via guidance rather than legislation.
7. Proof of non-corporate carrier identity may be required i.e. copy of passport, driving licence, utility bill, bank statement etc. before a registration certificate or disc can be issued.
8. Possibility of new offence of failing to display proof of registration and issue of fixed penalty notices for more offences.
9. Raising the maximum level of fines for carrier offences to reflect the maximum for other offences (£50,000 in the magistrates court and unlimited in the Crown Court).
10. New proposals for seizure and disposal of vehicles.
In summary, the carrier registration changes will probably make the system more manageable for the industry as long as the Agency’s IT system can cope and enforcers take a proportionate approach to offences. Responses to the consultation should be sent by 8 September 2008 and I will be making a response on behalf of many colleagues in the industry, so if you have any comments to add please feel free to e-mail me or respond directly. The consultation can be viewed at: http://www.defra.gov.uk/corporate/consult/waste controls/index.htm.
Marco Muia BSc (Hons) MSc MCIWM is the Director of Oaktree Environmental Limited. He specialises in all aspects of waste planning and regulation consultancy. He also holds the level 4 COTCs for Hazardous Waste Treatment and Transfer. You can contact Marco on 01606 558833 if you have any questions about this article or e-mail him at enviroman@theskip.net
July 18, 2008 at 11:26 am | Environmental News | No comment
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GREENGROCER FINED FOR RECYCLING!
Local council red tape in Workington, Cumbria, is preventing a greengrocer from recycling his waste, and instead forcing him to use council services to send it all to landfill. They are also adding a £300 fine into the bargain.
Colin Glaister, who is the owner of the Fruit and Veg shop on Oxford Street, was fined by Allerdale Borough Council after he failed to produce a waste transfer note. He was told it was illegal for him to put his vegetables on a compost heap and cardboard on a household recycling site without the notice.
He said: “A £300 fine for recycling waste out of the shop is unfair. Everyone says you should recycle and do your bit. I take all my cardboard to Smurfits. All my fruit and vegetables go on the garden compost heap. We don’t waste them. My uncle takes the cabbages and feeds them to his chickens. I put the potatoes on the compost heap and it goes back into the land. But the council says I am not allowed to do that.
When I asked them what would happen to all my rubbish I was told it would all go to the landfill.”
Mr Glaister, 26, of Salterbeck, is understandably angry about the fine because he was not guilty of fly-tipping.
“If I loaded my van up and disposed of it I would deserve it,” he added. “I am mad that I have been done for recycling.”
Mr Glaister said that, although he has now applied for a bin, he has also written a letter of appeal to the council.
He added: “I think I have been treated unfairly. I said I am sorry I broke the law. I didn’t realise at the time I could do that by recycling. I have been told it is illegal to take the waste off my premises by moving it in my van.
They told me I was breaking the law and that I was supposed to hire a bin off the council. They will empty the bins once a fortnight. That will cost me about £5 a time. The rubbish will be left in my bin for two weeks during the summer. Who wants to smell rotting vegetables every day in the hot weather?”
An Allerdale Council spokeswoman stated that, under the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005, business owners must show how they dispose of their waste. If they fail to do this they will be issued with a fixed penalty notice. She said that workers at the shop were warned three times before the fine was dished out and that Mr Glaister was visited on April 3 and failed to produce the necessary legal documentation. Officers wrote on April 10 advising of a visit on April 21 at which the documentation would be required.
“The proprietor still failed to provide the necessary legal notice and was therefore issued with a fixed penalty notice,” she added.
“The proprietor has since arranged a contract for waste disposal with the necessary documentation.”
She said it was not the council’s intention to fine people. “The idea is to encourage them to think about who they give their waste to and not to simply choose the cheapest option or dump their rubbish.”
By law, a waste transfer notice has to be produced by a business whenever trade waste is transferred from a business premises to a registered waste carrier or waste disposal operator. The idea behind the notice is obviously a decent one and should combat illegal dumping. However, fining a business which is responsibly disposing of their waste seems ludicrous. Companies taking responsibility for their waste without unnecessary use of council resources surely should be encouraged (as the council spokeswoman suggested). Can the local borough council really need the £300 that badly?
An initiative whereby greengrocers distribute their waste produce as compost to local allotments and council gardens seems to be a brilliant idea. Sadly, maybe it would only work if someone could make money out of it rather than save money.
June 12, 2008 at 8:52 pm | Environmental News | No comment
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GOOD NEWS IS NO NEWS!
Last month I considered that a review of the Environmental Permitting system was needed to establish what immediate impact, if any, was occurring. The news so far is that no-one seems to be bothered, let alone the Environment Agency so I shall write that one if and when things hot up. Looking at some of the news in the world of waste over the last month it is amazing to see the impact of recycling on news stories in the national press, sadly much of it is negative and does little to promote recycling, but there are some rays of light. A bit a of a spring clean of an article, but food for thought nonetheless.
Board mills grumble
I recently wrote about the growth of the biomass sector and the domination of the waste wood market by the board mills. On 15/4/08 Letsrecycle.com reported that board mills were concerned over competition for wood from biomass plants. Given that the gate fees charged for waste wood at the mills range from £2 to £42 per tonne it is not surprising that biomass is a growing sector, with or without the Renewable Obligation Certificate (ROC). The board mills have had it good and had they treated the recycling sector differently by engaging in long term contracts the recycling sector wouldn’t be stampeding towards biomass plants to secure their own futures.
Kerbside enforcers
Some businesses in Devon have been told by South Hams District Council that it does not offer a business recycling scheme and went on to say that anyone taking waste home to recycle could face prosecution. Once again enforcement officers are looking for easy targets. All their advice does is push small businesses into not recycling. If a member of staff drinks a can of pop in the street it can legally be binned but if they drink it in the office it cannot be taken home for recycling. Get a life! I have seen similar comments from enforcement officers on the Waste Matters website (www.wastematters.org.uk/) and cannot understand why vast amounts of public money are used to target well meaning people when the flytippers are the biggest problem to deal with. When you have finished with the flytippers take a look at the minor offences if that gets you going but for goodness sake target the worst offenders first. Prosecutions should be in the public interest and regulators must take a proportionate approach to enforcement if they are to be truly effective.
Mobile phone madness
On 21 April the Guardian reported that a California telecoms company, Hop-on, is marketing a £10 disposable mobile phone in Europe, which has been available in the US since 2002. Early distribution is said to be 150,000 units. The phone can be recycled, has no screen and is pretty basic, being marketed as a back up phone but it can be topped up and not thrown away, if it lasts long enough. In the current consumer climate a product so low down the waste hierarchy seems insane.
Kerbside landfills
Our national press is at it again. The only good waste story is a negative one. Last month the Telegraph reported that thousands of tons of kerbside recyclate ends up in landfill sites or incinerators, based on a survey carried out by the Local Government Association. The resultant statistics led to statements from Friends of the Earth, amongst others, that “… it shows that the way many councils are approaching recycling is just not working”.
Other quotes were used to demonstrate that this practice undermines their confidence, like national newspapers focussing on failures doesn’t? What we do need to do is focus on recycling methods rather than scaring the public, who are more than happy to have their consciences eased by recycling less. Getting them started again is then more difficult.
The article mentions co-mingling of recyclables, which naturally allows more waste to be collected and will also result in some residual material being disposed of. If your local authority doesn’t use that method then the losses should be minimal but Joe public upon reading the article would not know that. The Local Government Association Environment Board have stated that the 240,000 tons disposed of was only 1.6% of the total recycling material collected, in other words we have recycled 15 million tonnes. Whichever side of the argument you take a residual loss of 1.6% is pretty low when compared with many mixed waste streams.
Agency pushes pretreatment compliance
Last year the Environment Agency publicly stated that they would take a light touch on enforcing the pretreatment requirements for waste destined for landfill. So last month it announced that it expects the waste industry to take a tougher stance on the evidence required to prove compliance with the requirement to pretreat wastes going to landfill. Operators will be expected to obtain written confirmation from their customers that waste has been pretreated before landfill. Skip companies actively engaged in recycling are already helping waste producers comply with the pretreatment rules simply by processing their waste. As long as such declarations are provided on transfer notes there is little else to do.
And finally…
The Chartered Institute of Waste Management (CIWM) has held its Annual Conference and Exhibition in Torbay for the last 22 years but announced that this year will be its last on the English Riviera. From 2009 the new venue will be London Excel at London Docklands and the CIWM will be teaming up with the Environmental Services Association (ESA) to bring a new recycling based focus to the exhibition. Hopefully this will bring the exhibition closer to the skip industry and provide an alternative event to the MRW’s Recycling and Waste Management Exhibition, held every September at the NEC. It would of course be better placed in the Midlands to make it equally accessible to those of us up North and in Scotland.
Marco Muia BSc (Hons) MSc MCIWM is the Director of Oaktree Environmental Limited. He specialises in all aspects of waste planning and regulation consultancy. He also holds the level 4 COTCs for Hazardous Waste Treatment and Transfer. You can contact Marco on 01606 558833 if you have any questions about this article or e-mail him at enviroman@theskip.net
May 21, 2008 at 4:38 pm | Environmental News | No comment
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