Time to Discard the Concept of Waste?

The concept of waste is of the utmost importance in determining the regulatory and economic framework for much environmental protection. Its origins, however, reveal a history of considerable disagreement concerning the concretisation of that concept. Recent case law of the European Court of Justice has tended towards the creation of a non-substantive concept of waste. A non-substantive concept of waste carries certain disadvantages and difficulties, including possibly undesirable inclusion of materials subject to recycling/recovery processes. Other elements of the EC concept of waste show divergence between international and European formulations as well as potentially problematic national divergence. The author takes the view that the key environmental problem caused by waste (pollution) is more properly captured by a value concept of waste since this relates directly to the causal mechanisms of pollution. Value concepts of waste are not new and would not include materials undergoing recycling or re-use. Beyond value concepts of waste, there may be grounds for moving away entirely from classification of materials as waste and regulating all substances, waste and non-waste alike, on the basis of their environmental risk.