WEEE delay could cost authorities £140M

15 November 2006

The two-year delay in implementing the Directive on Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment is likely to cost waste disposal authorities £140M by the time it is introduced next July.
The Local Government Association has warned of a repeat of the ‘fridge mountain’ fiasco four years ago – when authorities incurred millions in costs when they had to store fridges for which there were no recycling facilities – if the cost of recycling WEEE is not covered.
Councils have had to pay companies to take away, de-pollute and recycle an estimated one million tonnes of electrical items generated annually since August, when the Directive was meant to have been fully implemented.
Only Malta and the UK have failed to bring the Directive into national law. No provision has been made to pay for the estimated £9M annual operational cost of collecting WEEE at civic amenity sites.
Cllr Paul Bettison, chair of the LGA’s environment board, said it was ‘unacceptable that the council taxpayer should be expected to shoulder the burden for new schemes that businesses should be paying for’.

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WEEE delay could cost authorities £140M

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