Press Release - Reducing the reliance on landfill in
England
26 July 2006
There is a significant risk that local authorities in England
will fail to reduce the amount of biodegradable waste sent to
landfill by enough for the UK to meet EU targets, according to a
report by Parliament?s spending watchdog. The Government intends to
penalise local authorities who fail to make their share of the
required reductions under Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme (LATS)
- a scheme introduced by Government to help Local Authorities
comply with meeting their obligations under the EU Landfill
Directive.
Failure to meet the national targets could also result in the EU
issuing fines against the UK Government, which currently sends a
higher proportion of municipal waste to landfill (75 per cent) than
most other EU countries. These fines could also be later passed on
to the local authorities in addition to the scheme penalties
mentioned above.
Meeting the targets will require an increase in recycling and in
the number of waste treatment plants, but there have been
difficulties in both of these areas. To improve the prospects of
achieving the targets, the Department should focus on helping the
25 authorities responsible for half of all municipal waste sent to
landfill and on ensuring data used for the Landfill Allowance
Trading Scheme are more accurate and up to date.
Meeting the EU targets requires a reduction of at least 3.5
million tonnes of biodegradable waste sent to landfill by 2010, and
a further 3.7 million tonnes by 2013. Today?s report from the
National Audit Office estimates that, if no further action is taken
beyond that already planned, local authorities will miss the 2010
target by approximately 270,000 tonnes (equivalent to the waste
produced by some 225,000 households) and the 2013 target by almost
1.4 million tonnes (equivalent to the waste of some 1.2 million
households). Exceeding Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme allowance
allocations in 2010 could lead to local authorities receiving
Scheme penalties totalling ?40 million a year, rising to ?205
million a year for exceeding allowance allocations in 2013.
Failure to meet the Landfill Directive targets could also result
in substantial fines imposed on the UK Government by the EU.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra)
has provided local authorities with ?336 million between 2002-03
and 2005-06 to encourage recycling and composting. However, the
growth of recycling, from 11 per cent of household waste in 2000-01
to 23 per cent in 2004-05, has been outweighed by an increase in
the amount of waste being produced. The Department forecasts that a
recycling figure of approximately 40 per cent will be needed to
meet EU targets, but the NAO study suggests this will be difficult
to achieve.
Difficulties in securing both funding and planning permission
have contributed to delays in building new waste treatment plants.
The Department should focus on helping the 25 waste disposal
authorities sending the largest amounts of biodegradable municipal
waste to landfill to develop new treatment facilities, including
plants to convert waste to energy. The Department should also help
promote the benefits of alternative waste disposal methods to the
public, to address concerns over new plants and increase take-up of
improved forms of collection, as well as encouraging increased
recycling and composting.
To encourage local authorities to improve their performance, the
Department has confirmed that it will impose penalties on
authorities breaching their allowances under the Landfill Allowance
Trading Scheme.
Sir John Bourn, head of the National Audit Office, said
today:
Meeting the EU targets for reducing landfill will be a
tough challenge but there is much that can still be done if action
is taken now. Reducing the amount of waste going to landfill
requires both new treatment plants and a greater use of recycling,
and no one should be in any doubt of the scale of the challenge
involved. The weight of evidence shows that disposing of
biodegradable waste in landfill sites is harmful to the
environment, and if we are to substantially reduce our reliance on
landfill then there really is no time to waste?
Notes to Editors:
- In 1999, the EU introduced the Landfill Directive, requiring
the UK to reduce the amount of biodegradable municipal waste sent
to landfill to 75 per cent of the 1995 figure by 2010, 50 per cent
by 2013 and 35 per cent by 2020. This is equivalent to reducing
landfilled waste to about 14 million tonnes by 2010 and nine
million tonnes by 2013. The majority of the reductions required to
meet these targets come from England. Municipal waste covers
household waste, street litter and collected trade waste. Defra
estimates that individual households produce some 1,200 kg of waste
a year on average. Around 68 per cent of municipal waste is
biodegradable, such as vegetation, waste paper, food or card.
- In 2003-04, the UK disposed of some 26 million tonnes of local
authority waste by landfill, 75 per cent of the total. This
compares with 38 per cent in France and 20 per cent in Germany and
was higher than all other EU countries apart from Greece (92 per
cent) and Portugal (also 75 per cent).
- Under the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme, introduced in
2005, local authorities operate within an allocation of the amount
of biodegradable municipal waste they can send to landfill. The
Scheme allows authorities to trade allowances if they have excess
or insufficient capacity. Defra has confirmed it will penalise each
local authority ?150 for every tonne of biodegradable waste sent to
landfill in excess of its allowance.
- Press notices and reports are available from the date of
publication on the NAO website, which is at
www.nao.org.uk. Hard copies can be obtained from
The Stationery Office on 0845 702 3474.
- The Comptroller and Auditor General, Sir John Bourn, is the
head of the National Audit Office which employs some 800 staff. He
and the NAO are totally independent of Government. He certifies the
accounts of all Government departments and a wide range of other
public sector bodies; and he has statutory authority to report to
Parliament on the economy, efficiency and effectiveness with which
departments and other bodies have used their resources.
Press Notice 58/06
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