Pre-Treatment of Waste 

New requirements emanating from the European Landfill Directive (Landfill England and Wales Regulations 2002) came into force on the 30th October 2007 whereby all non-hazardous waste destined for disposal at landfill must first endure treatment. The new regulations which implement the remaining parts of the EU Landfill Directive are designed to prevent or reduce, as far as possible, the negative and harmful effects on the environment. This change aims to help increase waste recycling and recovery and to help reduce potentially polluting emissions from landfills that could have a devastating impact on our environment.

For the waste to be considered as pre-treated it must comply with the three-point test for the definition of “treatment”, namely that:

It has undergone a physical, thermal or biological process including sorting that:

•    must alter the characteristics of the waste and:

•    must do so in order to reduce its mass

or reduce its hazardous nature

or facilitate its handling

or enhance its recovery

One of the simplest forms of pre-treatment for general waste is categorizing a proportion of each waste stream and segregating it for recycling, which could be done either by you or by a waste contractor at a sorting facility.

Example 1:

A public house that currently places all of its waste in a bin for disposal at landfill, would either have to separate the waste streams – glass or plastic bottles for example – or ensure that the waste is taken to a sorting facility for it to comply with the pre-treatment requirements.

Example 2

Countrystyle already works with local authorities and commercial operations to collect waste from Civic Amenity sites. Once collected we segregate the wood from the other waste and provide onwards treatment e.g. shredding for wood reclamation and composting.

Please note that the compaction of items (e.g. squashing a cardboard box) is not considered to be a form of pre-treatment because the characteristics of the waste remain the same and it could therefore still have a harmful impact on the environment.

For waste streams where simple segregation for recycling is not possible, other acceptable processes such as mechanical biological treatment, thermal treatment, incineration with energy recover or anaerobic digestion can be used. Countrystyle can advise you on the best and most suitable method available for your waste.

The legal obligation for ensuring that no untreated waste is disposed of at landfill lies with the landfill operator, who has a responsibility to reject the waste if he believes it has not been treated. However as part of your duty of care and in order to comply fully to the new rules, waste producers must either treat their own waste or ensure that the waste will be treated by a waste contractor/management company before it is landfilled. Either way you will have to produce a waste transfer note or a written declaration stating:

•    who has treated the waste

•    the type of treatment, if any, that has occurred

•    The amount of waste that has been segregated and sorted for recovery or alternative treatment.