The Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011

PART 1 Objectives

Overall objective

1.  To protect the environment and human health by preventing or reducing the adverse impacts of the generation and management of waste and by reducing overall impacts of resource use and improving the efficiency of such use.

Application of the waste hierarchy

2.—(1) To apply the following waste hierarchy as a priority order in waste prevention and management policy—

(a) prevention;

(b) preparing for re-use;

(c) recycling;

(d) other recovery (for example energy recovery);

(e) disposal.

(2) When applying the waste hierarchy in sub-paragraph (1), the appropriate authority must ensure that it—

(a) encourages the options that deliver the best overall environmental outcome, which may require specific waste streams to depart from the hierarchy where this is justified by life-cycle thinking on the overall impacts of the generation and management of such waste;

(b) takes into account—

(i) the general environmental protection principles of precaution and sustainability,

(ii) technical feasibility and economic viability,

(iii) protection of resources, and

(iv) the overall environmental, human health, economic and social impacts.

Protection of human health and the environment

3.  To ensure that waste management is carried out without endangering human health, without harming the environment and, in particular—

(a) without risk to water, air, soil, plants or animals;

(b) without causing a nuisance through noise or odours; and

(c) without adversely affecting the countryside or places of special interest.

Principles of self-sufficiency and proximity

4.—(1) To establish an integrated and adequate network of waste disposal installations and of installations for the recovery of mixed municipal waste collected from private households, including, where such collection also covers such waste from other producers, taking into account best available techniques.

(2) The network must be designed to enable the European Union as a whole to become self-sufficient in waste disposal and in the recovery of mixed municipal waste collected from private households, and to enable the United Kingdom to move towards that aim taking into account geographical circumstances or the need for specialised installations for certain types of waste.

(3) The network must enable waste to be disposed of and mixed municipal waste collected from private households to be recovered in one of the nearest appropriate installations, by means of the most appropriate technologies, in order to ensure a high level of protection for the environment and human health.

(4) This paragraph does not require that the full range of final recovery facilities be located in England or in Wales or in England and Wales together.