The European Commission has released Guidance to clarify a couple of issues within the revised Waste Framework Directive which have been interpreted inconsistently across the continent.

The document confirms that European Member States are allowed to deviate from the Waste Hierarchy when treating waste if Life Cycle Thinking (LCT) shows a Hierarchy-deviating management process to have a lower overall environmental impact than a Hierarchy-following process.

The document also states that commingled collections can be used by Member States as a form of separate collection for paper, metal, plastics and glass. This is on the assumption that the quality of material, following post-collection separation, is of similar quality to the material collected by fully separate collections.

The clarification’s release has come approximately one month before Defra and The Campaign for Real Recyclng (CRR) are due back in Court where The English Government’s interpretation of the WFD, which included commingled collections as separate, is to undergo a Judicial Review.

Fellows Environmental attended a number of events last week as part of the company’s on-going effort to keep up to date with industry developments and forge ties with other companies in the local area.

On Wednesday, the On-Farm Energy Generation Conference 2012 was held at Stoneleigh Park in Warwickshire which gave an opportunity to meet with renewable energy technology providers and get a close feel for the interest in non-traditional farmland resource use, which the agricultural industry is always developing. The event included talks on government incentives, how to plan for on-farm energy generation, financing such a project and a whole range of other topics across the two days.

Thursday evening saw FE take a short trip to the Chancellors Hotel and Conference Centre in Fallowfield where the Institute of Engineering and Technology had organised a talk focussing on the installation of a CHP power plant at Media City in Salford. The presentation was given by a member of The Peel Group, developers of the site which has become the new home for BBC, ITV and Salford University, and covered topics ranging from the electrical engineering of the site, the benefits and uses of the site’s tri-gen energy centre and potential future developments which may be incorporated into the energy system.

Fellows Environmental also attended the Greater Manchester Business Fair at Salford City stadium and an event put on by Peninsula for Small Businesses at Trafford Park.

18-24^th June 2012 sees a nationwide focus on waste management thanks to National Recycling Week. The main aim of the WRAP-affiliated week-long event is to focus local authorities, businesses and retailers on recycling plastic bottles. Currently, the UK uses approximately 15million plastic bottles every day but less than 50% get recycled. Waste services are offering the chance to recycle more and more types of bottle as separation and recycling technologies improve, but public knowledge of these advances is not yet as high as it might be.

A website has been launched by Recycle Now which gives recycling information for everyday household items (not just plastic bottles) and explains what all the recycling symbols mean. It also contains an easy 4-step method to start recycling projects at work and gives a list of all recycling events across the country related to Recycling Week. Get involved!