Politics

The Council of the EU has favoured the treatment of textile waste in its position on the Waste Framework Directive, while breaking its promise to reduce food waste, the environmental network Zero Waste Europe says.

A Spanish corporation responsible for managing packaging waste in the beverage industry has been discovered manipulating data. Ecoembes claims a 71% separate collection rate for small plastic bottles (2021), but the reality is a dismal 36%.

Ahead of the 2024 European elections, FEAD has published its manifesto, calling for circular resources for a European Industrial Deal and proposing the establishment of a Circular Material Use Act.

FEAD, CEWEP, Municipal Waste Europe and SGI Europe stress that heat recovered from the thermal treatment of waste (WtE) should be considered as waste heat in the framework of the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) and the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED).

On Thursday, the European Parliament’s Committee on Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) voted in favour of MEP Jutta Paulus’ motion for a resolution objecting the draft Commission Implementing Decision on the mass balance approach under the Single Use Plastics Directive (SUPD).

EuRIChails today’s vote in the Parliament’s ENVI committee, in favor of a motion for a resolution opposing the European Commission’s flawed recycled content calculation mass balance method in the Single-Use Plastics Directive (SUPD).

Eunomia’s latest report recommends the replacement of the Waste Framework Directive with a Materials Framework Directive, and the establishment of EU-level powers on environmental taxation.

Yesterday, the Council of the European Union unanimously agreed to address the harmful practice of the EU’s waste trade, including plastic waste, by fully endorsing the revised Waste Shipment Regulation.

The new Waste Shipment Regulation (WSR) was adopted yesterday by the Council.

Despite legislative steps forward over the past five years, efforts to transform Europe’s largely linear, ‘throw-away’ economy into a circular one will require further bold action and strong implementation of existing measures.

Plastics Europe has published its biennial ‘The Circular Economy for Plastics: A European Analysis’ report.