International Review of Waste Management Policy - Department of ...

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• The effects of the Repak Payment System (RPS); 213 and
• The landfill levy. 214
Towards the end of 2000, a review of gate fees conducted by Kirk McClure Morton in
the context of work establishing the basis for the landfill levy suggested that gate
fees, in 1999, ranged from IR £15 (€19) per tonne to IR £32 (€41) per tonne for
household and commercial and industrial waste, with one landfill charging a higher
rate of IR £52 (€66) per tonne. By 2002, these had reached €102 per tonne, and by
2005, €124.50 per tonne (pre landfill levy gate fees). In short, between 1999 and
2005, the average costs of landfilling increased by a factor of 5 in nominal terms, or a
factor of approximately 3.7 in real terms.
In real 2005 terms, the differential was around €91 per tonne. Relative to the levy, at
a maximum of €15 per tonne in these years, this is a huge change. Equally, for waste
producers / collectors, because recycling ‘runs off’ the avoided costs of disposal, this
change will have had a significant impact.
It would seem reasonable to suppose that for commercial waste in particular, with the
relatively small (compared with those for household waste) levels of price support
through the RPS supports outlined in Table 11-4 below, that the significant rise in
landfill gate fees, as well as the (until recently) upward trend in materials prices would
have been far more influential in increasing packaging waste recycling than the RPS
rates themselves. These rates are only of any significance for steel and plastic.
The rates for household waste are more likely to have been influential in determining
the effort made to collect and recycle packaging waste (see Table 11-5). Yet the
quantities of packaging recovered through the household stream are far lower than
from the non-household stream (of the order a third of the recovered material.
Table 11-4: RPS Rates for Commercial ‘Back Door’ Waste Recycled (2008 rates, € per
tonne recycled)
Material Material Open Open Loop Loop Closed Closed Loop Loop Recovery Recovery Metal Metal Protocol
Protocol
Glass 4.20 12.60
Paper/Cardboard 4.20 9.45 4.20
Wood 6.30 10.50 4.20
Aluminium 10.50 12.50
Steel 36.75 36.75 10.50
Plastic 52.50 52.50
Source: Repak
213 See Appendix 12.0 for further information on the RPS.
214 One could argue that the Environmental Fund should also be considered as a separate influence.
International Review of Waste Policy: Annexes