In a video interview with letsrecycle.com, Steve Gough, chief executive of environmental compliance organisation, Valpak, has explained how recycling of packaging continued strongly during the pandemic. He highlighted how there was more material “at home and less on the go” although for WEEE there was a lost collection time with HWRCs being closed.
On batteries there has been an interruption with less people taking batteries back to supermarkets but now a bit of recovery, Mr Gough noted.
With regard to the new EPR regime, his view is that he hopes the system becomes more intuitive to explain it. “If there are going to be increased charges then they can be correlated, with more difficult materials picking up higher charges.”
And, he emphasised that it will be the producers facing these increased costs, which will see the transfer of the majority of local authority costs in recycling to the producers.
Commercial role
The Valpak chief executive said he believed there will be a role for commercial actors to get involved in some of the tasks under the new system but that there will also be an important role for a single body, for example, in deciding on what the modulated fee regime is.
Compliance schemes will deliver services and also data services which are very important to the new system to tie in with the charging regime, he suggested. And on what he termed “full negotiating costs, there will be an element of negotiation between the single body and the local authorities.”
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Source: letsrecycle.com Packaging
