Brussels, 16/06/2014 (Agence Europe) - Barring delay, the European Commission will finally present new proposals for a circular economy on 1 July. According to Janez Potocnik, European Commissioner for the Environment, a circular economy is on “in which nothing is thrown away and one in which more value from resources can be extracted by devising sustainable products that can be easily repaired, reused, remanufactured and ultimately recycled into the environment again in total safety” (see EUROPE 11089).
Originally expected on 18 June, this package, which is a combination of legislation and measures, is still undergoing the inter-service consultation process. It will contain a proposal for revising the three directives on waste, as well as a communication on food waste (prepared by DG SANCO and DG Environment), a communication on buildings and another from Commissioner Laszlo Andor on green jobs. On Monday 16 June, Joe Hennon, the spokesman for Commissioner Potocnik, explained that the delay was decided in an effort to present all the different connecting elements. It should be remembered that food, buildings and transport were identified by the European Commission as the three sectors ready for further development in the EU's circular economy.
“Not bad but could do better”. This is the assessment by the European Environment Bureau (EEB) of the package currently awaited, in view of the draft proposals on waste that were leaked. The EEB welcomed the fact that the European Commission had shifted towards 70% recycling rates for solid municipal waste, an 80% recycling target for packaging waste by 2030, and a ban on landfilling for all recyclable materials by 2025. The EEB regrets, however, that a prevention target is only being considered for food waste, that no specific targets for re-use are being proposed and there is no limit set for incineration.
Piotr Barczak, EEB Policy Officer for Waste, commented: “The Commission's package is promising but still falls short of what is needed. You can't build a circular economy just by recycling more and more with our current production and consumption patterns. You also need to cut down on the waste you generate and the way to do that is through legally binding waste prevention targets”.
The EEB fully supports the method being proposed by DG Environment at the European Commission to calculate rates of recycling. Acccording to the EEB, it is a major improvement on the reporting method currently used across the EU, which defines recycling levels as the amount of material that is sent to recycling facilities, without any consideration for the actual amount of material output that is recycled. As the proposal stands, the weight of recycled waste is defined as the weight of waste put into a final recycling process, minus the weight of any resulting waste which needs to undergo further backfilling, energy recovery or disposal. Stephane Arditi, the EEB Policy Manager for Products and Waste, said: “This calculation is very important because it protects the best performers against easy, cheap and sub-standard treatment of waste that occurs both in and outside Europe. This is how we can ensure materials are recycled with the quality necessary to put them back into the economy”.
According to the EEB, the European Commission's binding target of 30% for resource efficiency by 2030, based on the ratio of raw material consumption to GDP, is too low to encourage member states to improve their resource productivity. (AN)