The final phase of implementation of the landfill directive took effect on the 30th October 2007, meaning all non hazardous waste must be pretreated before being taken to landfill.
To fulfil this requirement, treatment of waste must satisfy a three point test:
- It must be a physical, thermal, chemical or biological process (including sorting)
- It must change the characteristics of the waste
- It must do these in order to:
- reduce the volume of waste
- reduce the hazardous nature of the waste
- facilitate handling of the waste
In reality, these requirement can be fulfilled simply and easy with two options.
- Pretreatment at source: typically though on site segregation, or isolation of recyclable materials. Should this route be chosen, your waste management provider must be satisfied of pretreatment, the evidence of which forms part of your duty of care.
- Alternatively (or additionally) Reconomy will arrange to pretreat all waste on your behalf through a transfer station or materials recycling facility.
In order to ensure that you benefit from this change in legislation, Reconomy have taken steps to confirm that all waste collected on our behalf is taken to a recycling or transfer facility. The pretreatment requirement forms a mandatory aspect of our supplier approval process, enabling Reconomy to guarantee full compliance.