Incineration of waste

The European Parliament has adopted the report drafted by Mr. Johannes BLOKLAND (EDD, Neth) for a resolution on the common position adopted by the Council with a view to adopting a European Parliament and Council Directive on the incineration of waste. This report was subject to amendments and the addition of new Articles. The new Articles put in place relate to: - the Directive on waste management plans including plans for the pre-sorting of waste intended for incineration which is said to be needed in order to supplement the Community strategy for waste management; - the Directive shall be without prejudice to other Community legislation on waste and on protecting health and safety of workers at incineration plants; - the incineration or co-incineration plants: if an incineration or co-incineration plant does not comply with the conditions of the permit, in particular with the emission limit values for air and water, the competent authority shall take action to enforce compliance. Furthermore, the amendments which are included in this report relate to: - the Directive is intended to contribute towards attaining the overriding goal of European waste policy, particularly in terms of waste hierarchy: prevention, recycling, incineration with energy use and final disposal; - the incineration of vegetable waste from the food processing industry; - the total organic carbon (TOC) content, minus the content of elemental carbon, is less than 3% or their loss on ignition is less than 5% of the dry weight of the material; - the date for the exemption for NOx shall now be 1 January 2007 and the date for the exemption of dust shall be the same.�