You are now (25th January) just 25 working days away from the deadline for operators with environmental permits in England and Wales to pass their continuing competence assessment. Worryingly it appears that many companies have not yet arranged to take the assessment. If you fail to do so the possible consequences could include yard closure.…
Industry leaders have called for “robust action” against scrap merchants who miss this month’s deadline for competence testing – despite complaints that the tests are unfair and irrelevant. Following changes in regulations in 2008, all managers of waste facilities with Environment Agency permits must have passed a WAMITAB Continuing Competence test by 29 February 2012.…
Metal recycler EMR is set to face a public hearing to determine whether its measures to reduce noise from its controversial Parkhall Works recycling sites in Stoke on Trent will be allowed to stand. A public inquiry, set to take place on Thursday (January 10) is due to be overseen by the Planning Inspectorate and…
More than a third of people think making money is not as important as protecting the environment and would install solar PV panels, even if there was no financial benefit. Solar comparison website The Eco Experts, surveyed 2,000 people and found 36% of people would embrace the renewable technology simply out of concern for the…
An Essex landowner has been handed a suspended eight month prison sentence and ordered to carry out 180 hours unpaid work for allowing an illegal waste site to be run on his farm for years. The landowner, Mr Roger Frederick Phipps, was also fined £15,000 for breaching two planning enforcement notices. The prison sentence was…
A long-awaited Code of Practice for materials recycling facilities has been launched for consultation today (February 1) by resource minister Lord de Mauley alongside a Quality Action Plan. The draft code of practice will require all materials recycling facilities (MRFs) over a certain size to measure the quality of their inputs and outputs. The results…
Waste Industry Health & Safety Guidance. A new health and safety strategy for the waste industry has been launched in a bid to cut incident rates by 10% year-on-year and reduce the number of fatalities to zero. The four year strategy, which was launched at the waste sector’s first health and safety summit last week…
A decision by Stoke-on-Trent City Council to enhance the city’s recycling collection service has left the authority facing a claim of around £645,000 from its energy from waste (EfW) contractor for not providing enough waste to feed the facility. The council is facing legal action from Hanford Waste Services (HWS), which operates the city’s EfW…
The government pledged an additional £40 million of support for the low-carbon energy and advanced green manufacturing sector in the UK, building on the support made available to these sectors at Budget 2009. It said that amongst other projects, the funding will enable additional support for small-scale and community-level low-carbon energy generation.The Pre-Budget Report also…
Two Hull-based waste businesses were fined a total of £36,000 after admitting to operating a regulated facility without the required permit. At Hull Magistrates’ Court Last month (March 28), Petrotech Services Ltd was fined £10,000 and ordered to pay £5,700 costs, while its sister company Petrochemical Services Ltd was fined £26,000 and ordered to pay…