7 WASTE PLANNING
100. The waste hierarchy emphasises reduction, re-use
and recycling as environmentally preferable options to disposal
for dealing with waste, and much of the foregoing relates to central
and local government's efforts to improve the part played by each
of those three approaches. Nevertheless, and in spite of the drive
to reduce dramatically the amount of waste being sent to landfill,
the role of incineration within England's waste management activities
is likely substantially to increase in the coming decade. The
Minister for Waste told us "there is no doubt that we will
have to increase the level of waste to energy in this country
from about 10 per cent at the moment to 25 per cent. It will still
be far lower than most other European countries and lower than
we thought it would have to be in the Waste Strategy 2000 because
we have done so well on recycling."[158]
101. DCLG is responsible for the planning process
through which applications for the facilities required to meet
that increase from 10 per cent to 25 per cent will have to go.
Incinerators are both expensive for those who construct them and
unpopular among those near whom they are built. Their presence
may also have an impact on local authority strategies to reduce,
reuse or recycle waste, particularly if they offer a cheap alternative
or if an incineration contract requires the incinerator to be
'fed'. The Environment Secretary, in launching the Waste Strategy
for England 2007, said that a major step to achieving the
Government's waste reduction objectives would be investment in
infrastructure to collect, sort, reprocess and treat waste.[159]
Those facilities will include MRFs, anaerobic digesters and associated
combined heat and power plant, and incinerators, and the NAO has
predicted that meeting EU landfill targets will require about
15 million tonnes of new waste processing capacity.[160]
The LGA anticipates £10 billion worth of investment being
required to build mechanical and biological treatment plants,
incinerators and other treatment and recovery facilities, and
the Office of Government Commerce reported that as many as 50
waste management contracts would need to be let every year for
the next four years to meet demand.[161]
Biffa Waste Services, one of the country's largest private waste
management firms, believes we are already two or three years behind
schedule on building capacity to meet the EU's landfill diversion
targets.[162]
102. Planning policy on waste is governed by Planning
Policy Statement 10 (PPS 10) Planning for Sustainable Waste
Management, and it is likely that changes will emerge in the
light of the White Paper Planning for a Sustainable Future
issued by DCLG in May 2007. Our evidence has highlighted the difficulties
of obtaining planning permission for major facilities. The Environmental
Services Association is unequivocal: "Obtaining planning
permission for new treatment and recovery facilities continues
to be a major constraint to development of new infrastructure
within the UK […] there has been little evidence that planning
for waste management facilities has become more straightforward."[163]
The LGA, too, notes the difficulty of obtaining planning permission,
but adds that public opposition is another major barrier.[164]
Recent changes to the private finance initiative have involved
reconsideration of commercial wastes and the grant of PFI credits
to contracts for residual waste treatment facilities. Opinion
on their efficacy has been mixed: WRAP welcomes the changes because
excluding collection from PFI deals means not tying in arrangements
for up to 25 years; the LGA, on the other hand, says the changes
have caused further delays, although it accepts they may bring
longer-term benefits.[165]
The Government has made it clear that substantial infrastructure
development will be necessary if waste diversion targets are to
be met in the coming decades. In its coming implementation of
the proposals in its planning White Paper, the Department for
Communities and Local Government will need carefully to balance
the desire for simplification in the obtaining of planning permission
for major waste-related infrastructure projects with the objections
of local communities to new facilities, including incinerators,
desired by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
to boost energy-from-waste production from its current 10 per
cent to 25 per cent.
103. Having passed through planning into operation,
waste treatment facilities further impact on local waste management
policies and strategies. East Lindsey District Council raised
the "real risk" that the presence of an energy from
waste plant might be a disincentive to schemes to promote and
encourage recycling.[166]
Certainly, the presence, or otherwise, of facilities within a
local area will determine the extent to which a local authority
adopts any particular disposal strategy, but this concern seems
over-stated. A further concern raised was the need to 'feed' energy
from waste facilities once built: as WRAP notes, highly capital
intensive plants such as incinerators may require between 12 and
18 years of operation to pay back their investment.[167]
Once again, the presence of such a facility, potentially offering
both an immediately cheaper disposal option than recycling and
a need to keep it going to fulfil a return on investment may affect
local authority choices on how to dispose of waste. This is a
real concern, although the need to more than double England's
energy from waste may reduce it in the early stages. In the medium
term, those authorities that decide to invest in producing
more energy from waste will need to develop strategies to send
only unrecyclable material for incineration and to use the flexibility
in the Landfill Allowances Trading Scheme to trade incineration
capacity with other authorities who may otherwise find it difficult
to reduce their landfill to the extent required.
158 Q 273 Back
159
HC Deb, 24 May 2007, col. 1463 Back
160
NAO, Reducing the reliance on Landfill in England, HC 1177,
26 July 2006 Back
161
RC 40, Local Government Association memorandum, printed in vol.
II Back
162
RC 33, Biffa Waste Services Ltd memorandum, printed in vol. II Back
163
RC 17, Environmental Services Association memorandum, printed
in vol. II Back
164
RC 40, Local Government Association memorandum, printed in vol.
II Back
165
RC 44, Waste and Resources Action Programme memorandum, and RC
40, Local Government Association memorandum, both printed in vol.
II Back
166
RC 5, East Lindsey District Council memorandum, printed in vol.
II Back
167
RC 44, Waste and Resources Action Programme memorandum, printed
in vol. II Back
|
