Current status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 19 September 2024
To ask the Scottish Government whether it will utilise the powers under the Pollution Prevention and Control Regulations 2012 to direct SEPA to temporarily or permanently refuse incineration permits.
As Scotland moves towards a circular economy, we must treat residual waste responsibly. This is why the Scottish Government commissioned the independent review of the role of incineration in the waste hierarchy (the Review), published in 2022.
The Review underlined that that the best form of residual waste treatment is preventing waste from occurring in the first place, but in the short-term incineration has a role to play as we make the transition to a circular economy and end the practice of sending biodegradable municipal waste to landfill by 2025.
The Pollution Prevention and Control (Scotland) regulations 2012 (“the PPC regulations”) require that SEPA make impartial assessments of all PPC Permit applications and make decisions relating to environmental permits in accordance with these regulations. Whilst Scottish Ministers do have the ability to intervene in the PPC process by way of a direction, they would not normally do so in the absence of exceptional circumstances.
The Review recommended that no further planning permission for incineration facilities, beyond what was already in place, should be granted. This was reflected in National Planning Framework 4, which came into force on 13 February 2023 and is clear that development proposals for energy from waste facilities will not be supported except under very limited circumstances.
An updated incineration capacity analysis by Zero Waste Scotland (which is being finalised for publication later this year) indicates that facilities currently in development are required to help meet Scotland’s impending waste management needs, including for when the ban on landfilling biodegradable municipal waste comes into force on 31 December 2025.
The key policy levers on this matter exist within the planning system. We will continue to work with SEPA, planners and the wider sector to ensure appropriate management of incineration capacity issues.