Web-Resol Tudo sobre Limpeza Urbana e Resíduos Sólidos!
UK Chancellor Gordon Brown has announced further important steps in the Government’s strategy to protect the environment, including action to tackle the problem of waste, and expand on the Government’s strategy for using economic measures for delivering environmental benefits. Building on its recent Budgets, the Government today announced a series of targeted measures to help to deliver environmental benefits, including the following.
Waste
Waste Strategy 2000 sets out the Government’s vision of sustainable waste management in England. It sets challenging targets for recycling and composting, recovery of household and municipal waste and reducing the amount of industrial and commercial waste sent to landfill. The Cabinet Office Strategy Unit has conducted a review of waste policy, considering the role of different policy measures, including economic instruments, in achieving the Government’s waste targets. The Strategy Unit’s conclusions are being published alongside the Pre-Budget Report.
Landfill tax
The Government is already committed to increasing the standard rate of landfill tax (which covers active waste) by £1 each year until 2004-05, in line with the landfill tax escalator announced in 1999. The Government also announced in Budget 2002 that it expected that the standard rate would need to be increased significantly in the medium term. Subject to consultation on details, the Government has announced that it will increase the landfill tax escalator to £3 per tonne in 2005-06, and by at least £3 per tonne in future years on the way to a medium- to long-term rate of £35 per tonne. The Government’s intention is that the increases will be introduced in a way that is revenue-neutral to business as a whole. The Government will consult with stakeholders on options for the package, including the recycling of revenue, before making any decisions.
No changes are being made to the lower rate for inactive waste, which remains at £2 per tonne.
Aggregates levy
Following extensive consultation with industry, and failure to secure a voluntary scheme, the Government introduced the aggregates levy on 1 April 2002 to incorporate the environmental costs in the price of virgin aggregates. Following independent research, the levy was set at a rate of £1.60 per tonne on virgin aggregate commercially exploited in the UK.
In the 2001 Pre-Budget Report the Government announced that it would examine proposals to deliver additional environmental benefits through the aggregates levy by encouraging the positive use of aggregates waste. Following informal discussion with the industry, the Government will issue a formal consultation paper shortly in order to gather further information on the issues involved.
Artigos Relacionados
Check Also
Waste management poses challenges, but could unlock major environmental and economic gains
Every day, the city of Rio de Janeiro, one of the largest metropolises in the Southern Hemisphere, generates 17,000 tonnes of waste, ranging from large industrial debris to candy wrappers bought innocently at newspaper stands. While this waste presents a serious and urgent environmental challenge, it also fuels an increasingly significant portion of the economy, with benefits extending beyond financial gains. - When we look at developed European countries, many are already recycling between 40% and 50%, with some reaching 60%. From an economic standpoint, both recyclable materials and organic waste hold tremendous value - stated Adalberto Maluf, National Secretary for Environment and Environmental Quality at the Ministry of the Environment (MMA), during the Methane Forum: Climate Emergency Brake, at the Rio Nature and Climate Week. Citing a 2025 report, Maluf mentioned that Brazil literally throws away R$27 billion annually, while municipalities spend significantly more - R$45 billion - managing all this waste, often overlooking the environmental impact or economic potential buried in landfills and dumps. - We spend R$45 billion to collect and dispose of waste in landfills, yet we manage to recycle less than a third of the potential. I believe it will be necessary to review contracts, create performance-based remuneration mechanisms, and pay for both effectively sorted materials and those diverted from landfills - he added. According to the IBGE, 60.5% of Brazilian municipalities adopt some form of selective waste collection, and several initiatives serve as examples of how to manage city waste. In his panel presentation, Bernardo Ornelas, Project Coordinator at the Rio de Janeiro Municipal Urban Cleaning Company (Comlurb), highlighted Ecoparque do Caju, a national benchmark in waste management and recycling. There, received materials are sorted and can be used for biogas production, organic compounds for urban gardens, or human consumption, in the case of still...