Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 25 January 2024
121. Deputy Colm Burke asked the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications what action his Department is taking to reduce Ireland's reliance on exporting our waste for final treatment overseas, that consideration would be given to the development of national capacity to treat residual non-hazardous and hazardous wastes to reduce our dependence on treatment facilities in Europe; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [2632/24]
View answerThe Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy (WAPCE), Ireland’s National Waste Policy for the period 2020 to 2025, sets out an overall policy and regulatory approach to support the development of adequate and appropriate treatment capacity at indigenous facilities to ensure that the full circularity and resource potential of materials is captured in Ireland. This policy and regulatory framework is intended to create the market conditions required to support indigenous capacity by ensuring that the right material ends up in the right bin, and in a suitable condition, thus making it available for separate collection and subsequent recycling, reuse, or repair. Incentivised pricing systems backed by strong and consistent enforcement also play a key role. The measures outlined in the WAPCE provide a significant incentive to drive segregation, increasing the value of the contents of recycling bins and brown bins and thereby creating the necessary conditions to support the viability of indigenous recycling capacity as well as composting and digestate facilities. The Regional Waste Management Planning Offices will shortly launch a new National Waste Management Plan (NWMP) which will set out the required actions at local and regional levels to deliver on the WAPCE and support Ireland's circular economy transition.
A number of measures outlined in the WAPCE have already been successfully introduced, including the following:
• The revision of the list of material accepted in the missed dry recyclable bin to now include soft plastics.
• The introduction of incentivised waste collection charging in the commercial waste sector.
• The introduction of an initial €10 per tonne Waste Recovery Levy on municipal waste recovery operations in Ireland and on the export of municipal waste for recovery abroad.
• An increase of €10 per tonne on the existing Landfill Levy from €75 per tonne to €85 per tonne.
• The expansion of the household “brown” bin collection service to now make it mandatory as part of a waste collection service for all households.
• Continued efforts to drive behavioural change through education and awareness campaigns.
• Ensuring that waste enforcement activities are focused on maximising the proper segregation and recycling of municipal waste through making household and commercial waste a National Waste Enforcement Priority.
A number of other significant measures, which are due to be delivered over the lifetime of the WAPCE, will also have a major impact on our municipal recycling rates including a Deposit and Return Scheme (DRS) for certain plastic bottles and aluminium cans which will come into operation in February 2024.
