New publications this month:
HM TREASURY
Budget 2020
The 2020 Budget was delivered on 11 March 2020. A broad range of commitments were made regarding the environment and climate change and include the following:
Waste and Resources
Climate Change and Energy
Wildlife and Biodiversity
HM REVENUE & CUSTOMS
Plastic packaging tax
Information is provided on the plastic packaging tax, which will apply from April 2022.
ENVIRONMENT AGENCY
Setting up a climate change agreement (CCA)
The CCA scheme has reopened to new entrants. Following the 2020 budget, it will now operate until 31 March 2025.
Meeting our future water needs: a national framework for water resources
This framework has been prepared to inform long term regional water resources planning. Plans are to be developed by the five regional water resources groups it defines. These plans are required to:
Regulatory Position Statement (RPS): Storing or treating COVID-19 cleansing waste at a healthcare waste management facility
This RPS applies to the management of waste from cleaning people or places infected or potentially infected with COVID-19. The RPS applies to persons who have a permit to store and treat healthcare waste under EWC 18 01 03*.
The RPS will be withdrawn in 30 June 2020.
Operator monitoring assessment: environmental permits
Guidance has been published on operator monitoring assessments under the environmental permitting regime.
MCERTS: performance standards and test procedures for continuous water monitoring equipment - part 3 water flowmeters
MCERTS performance standards have been updated to improve clarity and to add guidance on the combined performance characteristic and loop powered instruments.
Environment Agency strategy for safe and sustainable sludge use
This strategy concerns principles and priorities for the use of sludge on land.
FORESTRY COMMISSION
How to apply for an export plant health phytosanitary certificate
Guidance is provided on applying for phytosanitary certificates for the export of:
Plant Health legislation for forestry
Guidance on plant heath legislation applicable to forestry has been updated to reflect changes to legislation.
OFFICE FOR LOW EMISSION VEHICLES
Workplace Charging Scheme minimum technical specification
DC charge points greater than 3.5kW but not greater than 22kW are now eligible for this scheme.
DEPARTMENT FOR ENVIRONMENT, FOOD & RURAL AFFAIRS (DEFRA)
Assess the impact of air quality
Guidance has been provided on techniques to assess the effect of air quality on human health and the environment.
Air quality plan for nitrogen dioxide (NO2) in UK (2017): air quality directions
Two new air quality directions have been published, which require specified local authorities to take action to meet limits for NO2 in the shortest possible time. Deadlines are also set:
DEPARTMENT FOR BUSINESS, ENERGY & INDUSTRIAL STRATEGY (BEIS)
Funding for innovation in renewable energy
Proposals are now being sought for future offshore windfarm mitigation for UK Air Defence surveillance including technologies that could fill or remove gaps in radar coverage.
DEPARTMENT FOR TRANSPORT (DFT)
Decarbonising transport: setting the challenge
This document pulls together challenges and steps to be taken when the DfT develops its transport decarbonisation plan.
MARINE MANAGEMENT ORGANISATION (MMO)
Marine Pollution Contingency Plan
An updated contingency plan was published in March 2020.
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, ENVIRONMENT & RURAL AFFAIRS (DAERA)
Guidance on the Environmental Liability (Prevention and Remediation) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2009
This publication provides guidance on the application of the environmental liability regime in Northern Ireland.
BREXIT UPDATE
Draft Text of the Agreement on the New Partnership with the United Kingdom
On 18 March 2020, the European Commission published a draft agreement text for the partnership between the EU and UK after the end of the post-Brexit transition period.
Despite the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak, the transition period remains scheduled to end on 31 December 2020.
The UK would need to agree to the contents of the draft and ratify it for its requirements to come into force.
Environmental Content of the Draft Agreement
The agreement would commit both the UK and EU to maintaining levels of environmental protection that are in place at the end of the transition period, while seeking to increase this in the future. This commitment would specifically cover:
The UK and EU would be continued to apply the precautionary principle, principle of preventive action, principle that environmental damage should be rectified at source and the ‘polluter pays’ principle.
Nothing within the agreement prohibits or prevents either the EU or UK from regulating to increase their own levels of environmental protection or to tackle climate change in the future.
If jointly agreed, higher standards of environmental protection may be applied, including to additional areas. Internationally binding agreements, including under the UN, would continue to apply.
An independent body would be responsible for monitoring enforcement and application of environmental protection requirements.
Climate Change Measures
The UK and EU would commit to economy-wide climate neutrality by 2050. International climate agreements, including the 2015 Paris Agreement, would continue to apply.
A carbon pricing system covering at least the same scope and effectiveness of the EU ETS would need to be applied by the UK. The EU would be open to linking a UK system to the EU ETS.
It would not be possible to weaken existing climate change commitments at the end of the transition period, or following joint changes made after this date.
Aviation Safety and Environmental Measures
The draft agreement proposes that aviation safety and environmental measures are compatible between the UK and EU and that these are accepted reciprocally.
Energy and Raw Materials
Draft commitments under the agreement aim to facilitate trade and investment in energy and raw materials, while improving environmental sustainability and tackling climate change.
High standards of safety and environmental protection would continue to be applied to offshore oil and gas operations. This includes suitable measures to prevent major accidents and pollution incidents.
Unauthorised car dismantler receives six figure fine
A scrap dealer in Somerset has been fined for running an illegal car breakers yard.
When the Environment Agency visited the premises at Springway Farm, Westonzoyland, Somerset during January 2015, he claimed he was only repairing cars. However, the Environment Agency suspected that scrap car dismantling was being undertaken. The man had previously been informed he needed an environmental permit if he intended to dismantle vehicles.
Dismantlers are required by law to remove all hazardous components and materials from End-of-Life Vehicles (ELV) including batteries, oils, brake fluids and airbag cylinders. Sites must have special facilities including impermeable concrete floors to ensure spills of hazardous liquids are contained and do not cause pollution.
During a subsequent Environment Agency visit in February 2017, a number of car engines were noted on wooden pallets. The man said he had purchased them from a business in Manchester but was unable to provide any receipts.
Suspecting the engines were from vehicles dismantled at Springway Farm, the officer served the man with a notice requiring him to supply waste transfer notes for all wastes including hazardous wastes brought onto or exported from the site between 1 January 2016 and 17 February 2017.
Audits of local permitted scrap metal dealers later confirmed the man had been paid approximately £84,000 for car shells, engines, batteries, ferrous metals and non-ferrous metals over 20 months from January 2016.
In addition to payments received from his local scrap metal dealer, money would have been made from the sale of re-usable vehicle parts from the illegal business including the export of components to Greece and Georgia.
Breaches
The defendant pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 12 and Regulation 38 of the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016 with respect to the illegal ELV facility operated:
Penalty
The defendant was ordered to pay £384,100 plus costs of £16,629. He was also given an 18 month conditional discharge. He was also informed that if he re-offends and is prosecuted he would then face sentencing for both this and the new offence.
The defendant was also warned he would face a three-year prison sentence if he failed to pay the penalty imposed.
Sentence for director of firm that caused fly infestation and odour
A director of a recycling firm in Derby has been sentenced after the organisation repeatedly breached its waste permit and its actions led to the widespread suffering of its neighbours.
Between the summer of 2015 and the summer of 2016, The Shows Waste Management Ltd site was operated in breach of its permit by storing excessive amounts of inappropriate waste. This adversely affected people living nearby and on local businesses due to black flies and bad odour arising.
Large amounts of Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) waste was brought onto the site, shredded and stored in ways not permitted by their permit.
A request for a variation to the company’s permit to add RDF waste was refused in October 2015. However, when Environment Agency officers visited the site they found that the processing and storage of RDF had already begun. Other wastes not permitted under the permit, including 200 tonnes of ground refrigerator foam in plastic bales, was also stored.
Between November 2015 until April 2016 the Environment Agency received numerous reports of an increase in black flies in the area and odour complaints.
Environment Agency officers attending the site subsequently found a number of permit restrictions had been breached:
Environment Agency officers worked with the operator to ensure the bales of waste were removed and an insecticide was applied to combat the fly issue. A final visit by officers in August 2016 found all necessary waste had been removed and the site had been cleared.
The director was given a Community Order with a requirement to carry out 80 hours unpaid work. He was also ordered to pay £10,000 towards the prosecution costs.
Man fined for illegally transporting waste
A man from Hull has been fined after pleading guilty to illegally transporting waste.
Anyone caught transporting waste as part of their business, whether it is their waste or someone else’s, must have a Waste Carrier Licence.
The offences were identified during a partnership investigation involving the Environment Agency and Humberside Police, the DVSA (Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency) and Highways England in Humberside.
The man was stopped by police on 2 August 2019 on while driving a van. On inspecting the vehicle, Environment Agency officers found that it was carrying waste comprising scrap domestic white goods, including washing machines.
The man told Environment Agency officers that he had picked the waste up from the street. He did not have a waste carrier’s licence but claimed that he did not need one as collecting waste from the street was a civic duty. He would not disclose where he planned to take the waste.
Subsequent investigations identified that the waste had been taken to a recycling centre in Hull. The recycling centre confirmed the man had weighed in the scrap metal at their site on 2 August following his stop. They also confirmed that the man’s account had been used on 62 occasions between 2 August 2019 and 21January 2020 during which time he had weighed in nearly 50 tonnes of scrap metal and received £5,887 in payment.
The man was ordered pay £800, with costs of £1,632 and a victim surcharge of £80. A licence would have cost just £154.
