New publications this month:

DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENT, FOOD AND RURAL AFFAIRS (DEFRA)

Waste duty of care code of practice

This document, which provides guidance on complying with the waste duty of care, has been updated.

DEPARTMENT OF BUSINESS, ENERGY AND INDUSTRIAL STRATEGY (BEIS)

Determination of the 2019 carbon price under the EU Emissions Trading System

The carbon price for the scheme year beginning 1 January 2019 has been published. This will be £12.61.

Supply chain plan guidance: Contracts for Difference allocation round 3

Approved supply chain plans are required for contracts for difference applicants where the proposed low carbon electricity facility has a generating capacity of 300MW or greater. This document provides guidance on supply chain plans.

ENVIRONMENT AGENCY

Exporting waste: meeting EU equivalent standards

This guidance, which concerns evidence that packaging or Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) exporters can use to prove overseas sites are operating to equivalent standards to those in the UK, has been updated. Revised guidance is provided on documents required for exporters to Malaysia, Taiwan and Thailand.

BREXIT UPDATE

The text of a withdrawal agreement was agreed with the EU on 25 November 2018. Although agreed with the EU, this must be approved as part of a vote in Parliament on 11 December for it to be implemented.

The outcome of the 11 December vote will be covered in the December 2018 monthly update.

26 NOVEMBER WITHDRAWAL AGREEMENT

If ratified by parliament, the agreement will affect environmental obligations applicable to the UK.

TRANSITIONAL PERIOD

The withdrawal agreement applies a transitional period, which is due to end on 31 December 2020. During this period, the UK will retain EU market access on existing terms.

As a result, EU environmental policy would continue to operate in a broadly unchanged way.

Chemical Regulation during the Transitional Period

The transitional period has impacts on regimes including the regulation of chemicals, plant protection products and biocidal products.

Therefore, chemicals already registered, approved, authorised or classified in advance of 29 March 2019 would remain valid. The UK would be able to register new chemicals or products and would be required to recognise those being processed by EU Member States.

The HSE has stated that it would not be able to act as a ‘leading authority’ to conduct certain assessments under the REACH Regulation or regarding biocides and plant protection products but would continue to process plant protection and biocidal product applications.

BACKSTOP / SINGLE CUSTOMS TERRITORY

The agreement would establish a “single customs territory”: a backstop between the EU and UK that would apply after the end of the transitional period if no trade deal is reached between the UK and the EU.

As a result, the backstop may not be applied, and the respective sections of the agreement would not come into force.

Single Customs Territory Rules

Common requirements are applied on matters including environmental protection and health and safety under the backstop.

A ‘Joint Committee’ would be established, comprising UK and EU representatives. This committee would be required to oversee and facilitate the application of the backstop.

Environmental Protection

Under the backstop, the UK would be required to ensure that the standard and level of environmental protection applicable at the end of the transition period are maintained by the UK subsequently.

This ‘non-regression’ duty will apply to common standards on

• access to environmental information;
• public participation and access to justice in environmental matters;
• environmental impact assessment and strategic environmental assessment;
• industrial emissions;
• air emissions and air quality targets and ceilings;
• nature and biodiversity conservation;
• waste management;
• the protection and preservation of the aquatic and marine environments;
• the prevention, reduction and elimination of risks to human health or the environment arising from the production, use, release and disposal of chemical substances; and
• climate change.

These standards must be applied through effective enforcement of associated legislation. An independent body must be appointed to monitor, report on and enforce the UK’s compliance with these common standards.

Backstop Commitments on Climate Change

The UK would be required to meet ongoing international agreements on climate change. The UK will be required to implement a carbon pricing system reflecting the same scope and effectiveness of the EU Emissions Trading System.

Future UK legislation

Within the single customs territory, future environmental legislation made by the UK would be required to respect the following principles:

• the precautionary principle;
• the principle that preventive action should be taken;
• the principle that environmental damage should as a priority be rectified at source; and
• the "polluter pays" principle.

Joint Committee Role

The joint committee of the single customs territory would be required to apply minimum requirements applicable to the UK to:

• Reduce national emissions of certain atmospheric pollutants;
• the maximum sulphur content of marine fuels which may be used in the territorial seas, exclusive economic zones, and in the ports of the Member States of the EU and UK; and
• best available techniques, including emission limit values, in relation to industrial emissions.

POLITICAL DECLARATION SETTING OUT THE FRAMEWORK FOR THE FUTURE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE EU AND THE UK

A declaration has been published outlining the EU and UK’s intentions for their future relationship once the UK leaves the EU. This accompanies the withdrawal agreement.

Amongst other matters, the declaration commits the EU and UK to work together to safeguard environmental protection. The UK and EU also commit to retain autonomy and the ability to regulate economy activity for purposes of environmental protection, including with respect to climate change.

The declaration states that a future trading agreement would provide comprehensive and balanced arrangements on environmental services. The future relationship would also commit to global cooperation, including on matters of shared environmental and social interest, including on:

• climate change;
• sustainable development;
• cross-border pollution; and
• public health and consumer protection.

Any future relationship is to reaffirm commitments to international agreements on tackling climate change. World Trade Organisation agreements on sanitary and phytosanitary measures are required to be built upon and exceeded.

Common environmental and climate change standards are required to be applied to ensure open and fair competition within the future relationship.

Enforcement undertaking accepted following diesel pollution incidents

An enforcement undertaking submitted by the Carlsberg Supply Company UK Ltd (Carlsberg) has been accepted. This concerned two diesel pollution incidents affecting the River Nene in July and October 2017.

In July 2017, around 230 litres of diesel escaped into the River Nene. This followed a diesel spill the previous week which had been received the site’s surface water drainage system. Heavy rain in the days preceding the pollution incident is believed to have washed the diesel out of the drain and into the river.

The Environment Agency was able to contain most of the July 2017 spill by keeping the lock downstream at a nearby marina closed until the diesel was cleared up by the regulator and Carlsberg personnel.

In October 2017, an estimated 200 litres of diesel was received by the River Nene following similar circumstances. The diesel took the same path as the previous incident. Due to a faulty valve, the spilt diesel flowed straight into the River Nene.

Following these incidents Carlsberg is understood to have made improvements, including incident training and exercises, installing further preventative measures to the drainage system and revising processes and procedures to reduce the likelihood of spills happening again.

Enforcement Undertaking

Carlsberg offered an enforcement undertaking in August 2018. This comprised a total of £120,00 in donations as follows:

• £80,000 to the Wildlife Trust – Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire; and
• £40,000 to the River Nene Regional Park Community Interest Company.

The money is to be used to fund environmental improvements including coir rolls along the river at Foot Meadow Island on the River Nene in Northampton.

Enforcement Undertakings allow parties who have damaged the environment to offer to complete actions which will address the cause and effect of their offending, including making a payment to an appropriate environmental project. If accepted, the enforcement undertakings present an alternative to prosecution.

Further Costs

Carlsberg also paid the Environment Agency’s incident response and enforcement costs.

Fines after packaging and print firm polluted river with hazardous waste

Ablebox Ltd has been fined after polluting a river in Somerset with waste ink.

On 20 April 2017 the Environment Agency received reports that the River Yeo had turned purple downstream of the Pen Mill Trading Estate in Yeovil. Members of the public reported discolouration up to four kilometres downstream.

The Environment Agency traced the source of the pollution to Ablebox Ltd, a manufacturer of cardboard boxes that operates its own printing works.

Environment Agency officers returned to the premises the next day and saw waste ink being hosed into a drain. The officers also found that containers of waste ink were inappropriately stored and that spill kits were already full of soiled absorbents. Testing confirmed the waste ink had flowed through the site’s surface water system and directly into the River Yeo.

An employee was later found to have poured up to 50 buckets of waste ink down a drain over a period between two and three days period. He stated he’d done so on the instruction of management because there was no room left in the waste ink storage containers. Ablebox Ltd claimed the employee had taken it upon himself to dispose of the ink without the company’s knowledge.

Magistrates heard that Wessex Water had previously detected unauthorised discharges in the sewerage system and that Ablebox Ltd had been told they were improperly disposing of waste ink through the drain and sewers on at least two occasions.

Breach

Ablebox Ltd pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 38(1)(a) of the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016.

• Regulation 38(1)(a) makes it an offence to contravene Regulation 12(1), which requires that an environmental permit is held and complied with for the operation of a regulated facility, water discharge activity or groundwater activity.

Penalty

Ablebox Ltd was fined £6,000 and ordered to pay £1,281 in legal costs.

The company was also ordered to pay investigation costs of £5,566 and a victim surcharge of £170.

Environmental charities receive over £2.2 million from businesses that breached environmental legislation

In addition to the Carlsberg enforcement undertaking above, 14 charities will benefit from donations submitted as part of enforcement undertakings accepted for a variety of offences. These include the following:

• Wessex Water Services Limited - £975,000 benefitting Dorset Waste Partnership (£400,000), Dorset Litter Free Coast and Sea Project (£100,000), Purbeck District Council / Swanage Town Council (£400,000) and Durlston Country Park and Nature Reserve (£75,000);
• United Utilities Water Limited - £232,000 benefitting Mersey Rivers Trust (£90,000) and Community Forest Trust (£142,000) for discharging sewage into a brook;
• Yorkshire Water Services Limited - £200,000 benefitting Yorkshire Wildlife Trust for polluting a river;
• Northumbrian Water Limited - £135,000 benefitting Durham Wildlife Trust (£45,000), Wear Rivers Trust (£45,000), Marine Conservation Society (£45,000) for polluting a stream;
• Tesco Distribution Limited - £100,000 benefitting Yorkshire Wildlife Trust for discharging diesel into a watercourse and ponds; and
• Angel Springs Holdings Limited - £24,329 benefitting Marine Conservation Society for not taking reasonable steps to recover and recycle packaging waste.