ENVI’s report on the targeted WFD revision fails to respect the EC mandate
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Brussels, 14 February 2024 – In an effort to stem the ever-growing waste generation from textiles and food in the EU, in July 2023 the European Commission proposed a targeted revision of the Waste Framework Directive (WFD). Today, the European Parliament ENVI Committee adopted its report along with certain amendments which are out-of-scope of the proposed revision.
ESWET expresses its concern that many of the amendments adopted by the EP ENVI under the current revision of the WFD, exceed the scope of the revision as defined by the European Commission proposal, creating legal uncertainty. A proper revision of the WFD should be carefully assessed, designed, scrutinised, and considered, and in this legislative process there has been no impact assessment covering the entirety of the WFD.
In particular, we are disappointed by amendments that are out of the scope of this revision which encourage prior sorting of municipal mixed waste without provision for an impact assessment or cost/benefit analysis being undertaken.
It is estimated that an additional 60 million tonnesv of additional waste sorting infrastructure capacity would be needed across the EU to accommodate these amendments. As well as being costly, this would lead to increased energy and resource consumption, and it is reckless to propose such a scheme without having estimated its financial and environmental costs.
Therefore, ESWET calls on the European Parliament Plenary and the European Council to reject any amendments exceeding the scope of the current revision of the WFD and keep the focus of this WFD revision only on textile and food waste.
The food and textile sectors generate 72.6 million tonnes of waste each year. Dramatic action must be taken and ESWET wholly supports the maximisation of recycling, the reduction of waste, and protecting Europe’s environment.
“The EU legislators should deliver a Waste Framework Directive which provides optimal protection to Europe’s environment and its citizenry, while ensuring legal certainty in the legislative procedures”, commented Patrick Clerens, Secretary General of ESWET.