New Packaging Recovery Note (PRN) Data Means Potential Government Intervention

The Environment Agency communicated late on Wednesday 29 July new PRN data by material type which could potentially lead to interventions. RECOUP have been asked by Defra for insight around the markets and potential interventions and would welcome views from members.

The data shows 417,365 tonnes of PRNs/PERNs from January to June compared to last year’s data of 586,191 tonnes in the same period, a 29% drop.

Defra have reached out to RECOUP after this week’s PRN Reform meeting, and they would like dialogue around the following in an upcoming call (date to be confirmed):

• Insight into the difference from last year. One of Defra’s concerns is that the new accreditation and reporting requirements, and increased regulator enforcement action, has driven fraudulent operators out of the market who issued evidence on packaging that never existed, but of course this is difficult to quantify.
• The extent to which you have been able to or are planning to increase your output, and linked to this, the extent of the availability of suitable material to do this (material at the right price and quality).
• What is a realistic recycling target for this year considering quantity lost from the system.
• Views on any government intervention and how this is done.

The EA has since circulated a communication to packaging waste reprocessors and exporters on Thursday 30 July, which can be viewed here .

To note, we’ve reached out to Defra and the EA about a question on the data. The data on the ‘UK’ tab on the data sheet doesn’t match up to the ‘UK Waste Balance’ tab. For example, there’s 42,328 tonnes (UK) and 12,705 tonnes (export) for January in the ‘UK Waste Balance’ tab, and 40,925 tonnes (UK) and 33,777 tonnes (export) in the ‘UK’ tab. The Environment Agency said they’d respond to as quickly as they could, but if anyone can shed any light on this, please contact Steve Morgan (steve.morgan@recoup.org).

The link to the data is here, which includes the data sheet. Last year’s data is here.