Review Of The Producer Responsibility Initiative Model In ... - Repak

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The European Commission has issued a Communication on “A resource-efficient Europe - Flagship Initiative under the Europe 2020 Strategy”, which provides a longterm framework for coordinated actions across many policy areas and agendas, including climate change, energy, transport, industry and raw materials. The European Commission has also issued a complementary Communication on a “Roadmap to a Resource-Efficient Europe”, which sets out medium and long term objectives as well as the means needed to achieve these objectives. The Flagship Initiative and the Roadmap are designed to lead the EU into economic transformation towards a more sustainable and competitive economy, and to contribute to world-wide efforts to ensure a transition towards a green economy. Some of the key milestones for the year 2020 on the Resource Efficiency Roadmap will be of fundamental importance to producers and, accordingly, will have profound implications for producer responsibility schemes. These milestones are to be facilitated by the implementation of a wide range of measures by the Commission and Member States. Relevant milestones identified for 2020 include: Citizens and public authorities should have the right incentives to choose the most resource efficient products and services, through the provision of appropriate price signals and clear environmental information. The desire of consumers for more sustainable purchases should stimulate eco-innovation in companies and to supply more resource efficient goods and services. Minimum environmental performance standards should be established to remove the least resource efficient and most polluting products from the market. Market and policy incentives that reward business investments in efficiency should be in place, stimulating new innovations in resource efficient production methods that are widely used. All companies and their investors should be able to measure and benchmark their lifecycle resource efficiency. Economic growth and wellbeing shall have been decoupled from resource inputs and shall derive primarily from increases in the value of products and associated services. Waste generated per capita shall be in absolute decline and waste will be managed as a resource with recycling and re-use of waste being economically attractive options for public and private actors due to the widespread availability of separate collection and the development of functional markets for secondary raw materials. More materials, including materials having a significant impact on the environment and critical raw materials, should be recycled. Waste legislation should be fully implemented and illegal shipments of waste shall have been eradicated. High quality recycling should be ensured, energy recovery should be limited to non recyclable materials and land filling should be virtually eliminated. Scientific breakthroughs and sustained eco-innovation efforts should dramatically improve the understanding, management, reduction of the use, reuse, recycling, substitution, safeguarding and valuation of resources. These achievements should be facilitated through increases in investment, along with greater coherence in addressing the societal challenges of resource efficiency through gains from smart specialisation and cooperation within EU Research. A major shift from taxation of labour towards environmental taxation should lead to a substantial increase in the share of environmental taxes in public revenues. Stakeholders at all levels should be mobilised to ensure that policy, financing, investment, research and innovation are coherent and mutually reinforcing. Public and private decision-makers will be guided by ambitious resource efficiency targets and robust indicators in the drive for transformation of the economy towards greater resource efficiency. Resource efficiency should be recognised as a global priority and progress on it should be secured on the basis of agreed approaches. 6
A Communication from the European Commission on a Revised Sustainable Production and Consumption (SCP) Action Plan is expected in late 2012. Green Public Procurement will be a key theme of the SCP Action Plan and it is also anticipated that actions addressing life cycle analysis methodologies, green criteria, the ecological footprint, reporting by companies and possible mandatory measures are being considered for inclusion in the Plan. Again, actions of this nature have a significant potential to impact on the current mode of operation of producer responsibility schemes. The “Innovation Union” is another Flagship Initiative in the “Europe 2020 Strategy”. Innovation is seen as the key to building sustainable growth, as well as nondiscriminatory and greener societies. The new Eco-Innovation Action Plan (EcoAP) is one of the commitments of the Innovation Union Flagship Initiative. Eco-Innovation is any form of innovation resulting in or aiming at significant and demonstrable progress towards the goal of sustainable development, through reducing impacts on the environment, enhancing resilience to environmental pressures, or achieving a more efficient and responsible use of natural resources. Eco-innovation is crucial to delivering the Europe 2020 strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. The EcoAP should boost innovation that reduces pressure on the environment and should bridge the gap between innovation and the market. It should expand the focus from green technologies to the broader concept of eco-innovation, targeting specific bottlenecks, challenges and opportunities for achieving environmental objectives through innovation. Key aspects of the new Action Plan that will have consequences for producer responsibility schemes include: 1. Using environmental policy and legislation to promote eco-innovation; 2. Supporting demonstration projects and partnering to bring promising, smart and ambitious operational technologies to market; 3. Developing new standards to boost eco-innovation; 4. Mobilising financial instruments and support services for small and medium sized enterprises; 5. Promoting international co-operation; 6. Supporting the development of emerging skills and jobs and related training programmes to match labour market needs; and 7. Promoting eco-innovation through European Innovation Partnerships. Wastes containing POPs (persistent organic pollutants) are required to be managed in such a way as to ensure that the POP content is destroyed or irreversibly transformed so that the remaining waste and releases do not exhibit the characteristics of POPs in accordance with Regulation (EC) No. 850/2004. It is expected that there will be a Proposal in 2012 to amend the POPs Regulation to establish minimum concentration levels for certain types of waste (e.g. polybrominated diphenylethers) under which waste materials containing levels of these POPs above such thresholds would be regarded as "POPs-waste". Therefore, any recycling of certain waste streams such as specific fractions of WEEE & ELVs containing POPs would only be permitted if such wastes were below these minimum concentration levels. These developments for new POPs wastes may affect the manner in which producer responsibility schemes manage the wastes they collect. Inadequate implementation and enforcement of EU environmental legislation has been highlighted as a major challenge by the European Environment Agency, European Parliament and the European Commission and under-performance is seen as a significant limiting factor in the anticipated benefits and achievements. A Communication from the Commission on a Proposal for a Seventh Environmental Action Programme (7EAP) is scheduled for publication in late 2012. As part of the wider resource efficiency agenda, itt is anticipated that the 7EAP will be more strategic in nature than the 6EAP, focusing on a limited number of important priorities such as 7
Page 1 and 2: Request for Tender For Consultancy
Page 3 and 4: 7 PROJECT REVIEWS. 8 PROJECT OUTPUT
Page 5: Minister. These producer responsibi
Page 9 and 10: The policy will be sufficiently fle
Page 11 and 12: We must both anticipate and respond
Page 13 and 14: The study should examine and report
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Page 17 and 18: initiatives such as deposit and ref
Page 19 and 20: 2.7. Tyres. 2.7.1 Introduction. The
Page 21 and 22: 2.10.2. Competition. A central focu
Page 23 and 24: initiatives, we are required to red
Page 25 and 26: An administrative proposal, to incl
Page 27 and 28: Knowledge and experience in success
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