The afternoon saw an interesting session for me, which might have been better attended. The main messages which grabbed my personal attention were that recyclates are traded on global markets and will go to the destination where they can command the highest price, and that the export of RDF is undermining the case for investment in UK infrastructure.
Recyclate markets which currently command the highest price are in Asia. For me, this is the fundamental issue around the recyclate quality debate. It shouldn't really be framed as a 'quality' issue at all but as a 'price' issue. The simple (and possibly sad) fact is that domestic reprocessors can't afford to pay the same prices for material of equivalent quality that their overseas competitors can. This can largely be attributed to the fact that domestic reprocessors have a much higher cost base, particularly for energy. Given that it is government policy to push up future energy prices, this is an issue which won't go away for reprocessors. Their best hope (in a competition for recyclate feedstock context) is to push an increasing proportion of recyclate sorting/processing costs back onto waste producers to offset their lack of international competitiveness in other areas. This is of course basically what their demands for material of higher 'quality' are all about.
The other concern which came across in the session was that the export of RDF is undermining investment in UK infrastructure. From a UK perspective, open markets and competition are generally always a good thing. For a waste producer, the presence of an export option will help to keep residual waste management costs down in a context where the landfill tax escalator is otherwise driving costs ever upwards.
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