Competition between domestic and foreign firms
DSD does not discriminate against foreign suppliers in so far as they can obtain a Green Dot on their packaging. However, in practice the quota for refillables could be barrier as imported packages are more likely to be one-way. The deposit refund will only be appropriate for domestic firms. So a refillable quota could limit imports. A tax on oneway containers would lead to increased supply of domestic returnables and tend to leave the amount imported unchanged, so there would be no problem as...
Implement harmonised standards for retreads crumb rubber and TDF
Safety should of course not be compromised just to reduce the problem of waste tyres, but studies have shown that retreads can be just as safe as new tyres and the retread industry even claims they are of a higher quality than the budget tyres from Asia and Russia. The main problem then is to convince the public of this fact. One way to do this is the introduction of clearly communicated safety standards for retreaded tyres that should be very similar to standards for new tyres. The UNECE...
The lifecycle of tyres
The increased number of vehicles has led to a tremendous growth in the volume of used tyres. Over a billion tyres reach their end of life in the world each year Brown and Watson, 2002 of which about 200 000 000 arise in Europe and 290 000 000 in the United States RMA, 2003 . From 1998 to 2008 this is expected to change by 2 every year. Vast quantities of tyres are stocked piled in designated landfills or illegally dumped, since a small quantity is presently reused and recycled see www .rma.org...
Signalling and market segmentation
Other market characteristics may also inhibit the take-up of recycled plastics. For instance, market signalling may play a role.48 Similar processes occur with other goods and services where product quality or similar attributes may be unobservable. Thus high quality cars are sold from opulent showrooms, and inferences will be made about cars sold from more basic premises. This could be used as a means of price discrimination, where a manufacturer will separate customers into those with a high...
Italy
In contrast to the UK, long-term enthusiasm for the re-refining of waste oil has led policy makers to support the manufacture of base oil from waste oil sources. From July 2003, new regulations were introduced to reform a system of subsidies paid to re-refiners and collectors of waste oils A statutory consortium consisting of representatives from the manufacturers of lubricants, waste oil collectors and re-refiners as well as public regulators manages the contractual arrangements for waste oil...
Nature of recovery closed loop open loop and energy recovery
Closed loop recycling refers to the situation where the recycled item is re-made, e.g. using PET bottles to make new PET bottles. This reduces the amount of raw material going into this product. Open Loop recycling refers to the case where different items are made, e.g. using PET from collected bottles to make synthetic fibre or plastic lumber. In this case, the amount of raw material going into PET bottle production is not reduced, and the savings arising here from the recycling of PET are at...
Addressing market inefficiencies in recyclable material markets
If markets operate in conditions of maximum efficiency and regulatory standards and other policy measures are introduced for different waste management options such as to reflect their external environmental effects, recycling will be at its optimal level. However, in addition to the potential for non-internalisation of environmental externalities, other types of market failure may constitute an impediment to the realisation of commercial opportunities in recycling markets. This project has...
Technological externalities related to recovery and reuse of secondary materials
A technological externality exists when the production function of one agent enters another agent's production or utility function, without the latter being compensated Kolstad, 2000 . Environmental externalities when they affect productive processes such as polluted irrigation water are, of course, specific examples of the more general case of technological externalities. However, they are by no means the only type of technological externality. In this section, the focus of the discussion is...
Alberta Canada
A comprehensive description of the Alberta EPR system was prepared for the OECD in December 2002 CMCL, 2002 . The system imposes an ADF the Environmental Handling Charge on most lubricant and oil filter products at point of sale and distributes payments Return Incentives to collectors to provide an incentive to return waste oil, packaging and oil filters to almost 600 specified facilities. The policy is broadly revenue-neutral, and the programme, which has been developed and is directed by...
Characteristics of lubricant oils
A complex variety of compounds, such as detergents, dispersants, anti-oxidants, emulsifiers, corrosion inhibitors etc., are later added to base oils by specialist manufacturers to create an extensive range of lubricant products. These additives can contribute 5 to 10 of the weight of the lubricating oil. Once base oils have been blended with additives, packaged and marketed the value-added-multiple for engine oil is in the range 5 to 60 times the average value of crude oil. The exact mix of...
Sweden
Reidy 1992 reports that the average composition of waste in Sweden in the years up to 1990 is 35-45 paper, 8-10 plastics, 20-40 other assorted recyclable materials, and 25-35 food and garden waste. A high content of paper and increasing content of plastics with reduced content of metals leads to high calorific value of 10-12 MJ kg. Packaging waste accounts for about half of all municipal solid waste in Sweden. Around 35 billion packaged products are sold each year. Attempts have been made to...
References Fvd
AAMVA 2000 , The Commercial Driver's Handbook, American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, Washington DC. Aardvark Associates 2001 , Post-Consumer Tyres Shifting Perceptions to Create Opportunities, Working Paper prepared for the Retread Manufacturers Association, Dorset. ADEME 2001 , tude du co t des fili res de traitement des pneus usag s, Rapport Final, ADEME, Paris. AIRP 2002 , Drop in Energy Consumption and Environmental Pollution One Million of Oil Barrels were Saved in 2001...
References 1
AEA Technology Environment 1998 , Power Generation and The Environment - A UK Perspective, AEAT 3776. Akerlof 1970 , The Market for Lemons Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Vol. 89, No. 3. Al-Ahmad et al. 1991 , Techno-economic Study of Re-refining Waste Lubricating Oils in the Arabian Gulf Countries, Resources, Conservation and Recycling Vol. 6, Issue 1, pp. 71-78. Ali, Mohammad et al. 1996 , Techno-economic Evaluation of Waste Lube Oil Re-refining,...
Evidence of price volatility
Prices for secondary plastics are collected by various bodies in different countries. In this section we will review some of the data from Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom. Generally speaking waste plastic prices in all three countries exhibit considerable volatility. Moreover, such variability tends to be greater for lower quality plastics, such as mixed PE plastics. Table 3.8 gives the standard deviations of prices for different recycled plastic products in three countries...
Conclusions and policy recommendations
The light-weight and wide range of resin qualities make plastics an effective material for many applications. The lighter weight of plastics packaging has benefits in transportation as well as reduced material in the waste stream. On the other hand, these same characteristics can make plastics difficult to recycle. Plastics packaging resin sales are increasing about four times faster than plastic packaging recycling. Since 1995, US plastics packaging resin sales have increased at an average...
Uses of major plastics
Given their versatility, it is not surprising that plastics have found a large number of commercial applications. Products based upon the production of plastics include the following APME 2000b High-density polyethylene HDPE Containers, toys, housewares, industrial wrapping and film, gas pipes. Low-density polyethylene LDPE Film, bags, toys, coatings, containers, pipes, cable insulation. Polyethylene terephthalate PET Bottles, film, food packaging, synthetic insulation. Polypropylene PP Film,...
Conclusion 1
An important conclusion to draw concerning the types of environmental risks described in this section is that those arising before collection, such as illegal dumping, are considerably greater when compared to the net increase in the risk of environmental damages from preferring any one recycling route over another. Consequently, if the policy objective is to minimise the risk of environmental damage, maximising the collection of the recoverable proportion of lubricants should be a priority. In...
Base oil and lubricant product trends
As can be seen in Figure 2.1 world demand for lubricants has been broadly static over the past 10 years, with a slight decreasing trend. However, static global demand masks regional variations that show demand falling in North America and Western Europe and, to a lesser extent Latin America. Conversely, the Asia-Pacific region and Central and Eastern Europe are exhibiting growth rates in the region of 2 per annum see Table 2.2 . Figure 2.1. World lubricant demand including marine oil Figure...
References Thj
Ackerman Frank. Gallagher Kevin 2002 , Mixed signals Market incentives, Recycling, and the Price Spike of 1995, Resources, Conservation and Recycling. gren H. 2000 , Sweden Agreement on Producer Responsibility for Packaging, AFR, Naturv rdsverket, Stockholm. APC American Plastics Council 2001 , The Resin Review 2000, APC, Arlington VA. APME Association of Plastics Manufacturers in Europe 2000a , Plastics - A Material Choice for the 21st century Insight into Plastics Consumption and Recovery in...
Retreading
When examining market failures for retreads, it is important to make a distinction between truck tyres and passenger car tyres. Although the technique of retreading tyres has been established for decades it has never broken through in the passenger car tyre market as a serious substitute for new tyres. Conversely, retreads are fully accepted for truck tyres, where about 50 of used tyres are retreaded. The limited share of retreads in the passenger car market is somewhat surprising but can be...
Removing policy failures which discourage recycling
Another public policy area which directly impacts upon recycling rates concerns the existence of policy failures which affect the degree of substitution between primary and recyclable materials.65 Two areas seem to be particularly important The provision of subsidies for substitute primary resource extraction and exploitation. The use of material standards which discourage optimal material choices. It has often been argued that various types of subsidies for the extraction and processing of...
The process of making plastics
Plastics can be divided into two major categories thermoplastics and thermosets. Thermoplastics can be remelted and reformed many times into different shapes. For this reason, they are the most commonly recycled plastics. Thermosets can only be formed once. After that, they may be ground and used as filler for future plastic products. Thermoplastic resins are the primary focus of this report because they are more readily recycled. The major categories of thermoplastic resins are high-density...
Waste oil and used oil
Approximately 40 to 50 of the lubricants sold are being lost through leaks or in the exhaust emissions during use the fate of the remaining 60 to 50 of the oil is potentially recoverable European Environment Agency, 2002 .28 Following a period of use that is typically less than 6 months, remaining lubricant is recovered along with various combustion, friction and heat-related contaminants. This oil - sometimes mixed with other contaminants such as water, solvents, antifreeze, brake fluid, paint...
Rubber recycling
4.2.1. Characteristics of the rubber recycling market Shredded tyres, also called crumb rubber, have various applications in the rubber recycling sector. Figure 4.7 shows that in the US in 2001, of the total 0.45 million ton 996 million pounds of crumb rubber produced, asphalt and moulded products were almost equal in market share, and combined had approximately 60 of the total market. The remaining 40 was used for the manufacturing of new products. Figure 4.7 shows that although consumption by...
Postcollection environmental impacts
Before or during collection from multiple-point sources, waste oil can be contaminated from either in-use sources or materials introduced through mixing. As noted above, in-use additives include a variety of compounds added during manufacture to meet performance specifications. In addition, waste oil is also likely to contain metals from engine wear unburned fuel PAH polyaromatic hydrocarbons from polymerisation and incomplete combustion of fuel particulates and water. It may also contain -...
The consequences of price volatility
Price fluctuations in the overall market will have important consequences for profitability and the long term survival of firms involved in recycling. Fluctuations in the quantities of different types of materials collected will interact with this, and firms will need to be able to cope with both types of uncertainty. Such fluctuations can arise from collection where the amount of particular materials included in the waste stream will change on an unexpected basis. This type of problem will be...
The reasons for price volatility
The financial viability of reprocessing firms arises out of the relationship between waste plastics and virgin resins. Where these are close substitute goods then the two markets need to be considered in parallel as demand in one market will depend on price in the other. Thus, forces determining the level of demand in one market will affect related markets. For many uses, reprocessed materials are imperfect substitutes for plastics made from virgin resins. In other cases, they are - at least in...
Table of Contents
Executive Summary Improving Recycling Chapter 1. Introduction and Overview of Market Failures and Barriers 15 2. The economic importance and structure of the recycling sector in OECD countries 15 United 3. The nature of potential market imperfections in secondary material markets 19 3.1. Transaction costs and search costs in secondary material markets 20 3.2. Information failure and uncertainty related to waste 3.3. Consumption externalities related to products derived from secondary...
Executive Summary Improving Recycling Markets
Markets for many recyclable materials are growing. The growth of markets for many classes of potentially recyclable materials is due in part to policy incentives, but also to more general commercial conditions. In many cases their development is supported directly by public authorities through measures such as collection schemes for recycled materials, deposit-refund systems, and public procurement schemes. Public authorities also provide indirect support for such markets through the...
Evaluation Of Costs And Benefits For The Achievement Of Reuse And Recycling
Ackerman, Frank and K. Gallager 2001 , Mixed Signals Market Incentives, Recycling and the Price Spike of 1995, Tufts University, Global Development and Environment Institute, Working Paper 01-02. Akerlof, George, A. 1970 , The Market for Lemons Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism, Quarterly Journal of Economics, 89 3 . Anderson, Simon P. et al. 1994 , Price discrimination via second-hand markets, in European Economic Review, Volume 38, Issue 1, January 1994, Pages 23-44. Apotheker,...
Comparative assessment
Given the paucity of data and the differences across the programmes it is difficult to provide a systematic comparative assessment of their relative efficiency. However, there does seem to be a distinction between governments which have introduced policies designed to favour the re-refining of waste oil and those which have sought to maximise collection rates. The former have necessarily sought to overcome the barrier of unsuitable quality waste oil undermining the viability of the re-refining...
The importance of plastics in OECD economies
Plastics cover a large range of different materials and uses. Since the introduction of celluloid in the 1870s, plastic has been used in an increasing number of products. The commercial development of plastics began in the 1930s, when polystyrene, acrylic polymers and PVC started to be mass-produced from petroleum. During the Second World War, the production of polyethylene, polystyrene, polyester, nylon and silicones grew, and polyethylene terephthalate was discovered in 1941. Since the 1950s...