The impact of waste management policies on climate change: what next?

Waste generation and disposal significantly contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and other environmental impacts. When waste decomposes in landfills, it releases methane, a potent greenhouse gas. When it decomposes in dumpsites (as is the case in many parts of the world) it also generates contaminated water known as leachate that causes pollution. 

Reducing waste generation and developing sustainable waste-management infrastructure are key solutions. However, infrastructure development and operation also require energy, contributing to carbon dioxide emissions and other environmental impacts. 

Effective waste management policies are crucial in reducing waste production, greenhouse gas emissions, and other environmental impacts, while supporting decarbonisation initiatives. Policies encouraging the transition to Net Zero, such as subsidising new technologies, can drive longer term emission reductions. Rapid advances in technologies such as AI and robotics for material separation, chemical recycling for plastics, waste-to-x conversion, and even plastic eating microbes present opportunities to develop policies that incentivise reduction, reuse and technological development, while taxing emissions. 

Waste comes from various sources, including municipal, commercial and industrial, agricultural and construction and demolition. Most countries have more data about municipal waste, which typically makes up between 10 – 40%¹ of the total waste. There is far less data about other wastes. However, focusing only on municipal waste excludes a significant amount of waste and emissions from targets and environmental taxes.

UK

Landfill tax in the UK, introduced in 1996, was the UK’s first environmental tax, and has had a big impact. It started at £7 per tonne of active (i.e. non-inert) waste and increased yearly, quickly making the cost of landfilling comparable to the cost of treating waste using a technology solution. It will rise to £126.15 in April 2025. Key benefits have been:

• A simple-to-implement, mass-based levy on the disposal of waste, irrespective of the source. 
• Allowing treatment technologies to compete with landfill.
• A reduced rate (currently £3.30 per tonne) for inert waste, which does not have the same environment impacts. 

There are multiple other waste management policies and regulations in the UK, but none are as simple as landfill tax, or have had such a material impact on the sector. 

The EU the Waste Framework Directive mandates that the waste management costs be borne by the original waste producer, implemented differently across countries. Germany, for instance, has extensive extended producer responsibility laws, holding manufacturers accountable for waste produced in manufacturing, using and disposing of their products. This uses market forces to encourage waste reduction and recycling. However, Germany’s affluence and existing waste management infrastructure are prerequisites for implementing such schemes.

Robust waste management is expensive. Many countries have looked at business cases for installing waste treatment systems, with the expectation that the money earned from the sale of recyclables will significantly offset the total cost of the development. Time and again, the economics are proven not to add up without a tax or subsidy for heat and power produced to make schemes viable. There isn’t always a way to collect taxes, or finance to pay subsidies for renewable or low carbon energy. 

However, lower income countries often have high recycling rates because the informal sector separates valuable materials for onward sale. Policy changes must protect those systems where they work well, while adding in measures to prevent child labour, improve health and safety and incentivise environmental performance in a way which is deliverable in the local context. 

Policies should consider a country’s current position, focusing on replacing dumpsites with engineered landfills and reducing waste, and then on diversion from landfill and value recovery – ideally focused on areas with the highest potential to make a difference from a social, climate change and wider environmental perspective. 

Our current material use and waste management practices are unsustainable. As the climate crisis intensifies, we need new policies and legislation that take a whole systems approach, balancing cost, climate impact, biodiversity and bankability.

We need to think globally. Food is shipped around the world, plastic waste from Wales is found off the coast of Indonesia and recycled rare earths are needed for new electronics. Policies which focus on reducing waste and carbon generation per capita, rather than recycling percentages, can drive changes in behaviour, technology and systems; keeping materials in circulation longer and preventing waste. 

Simple, implementable and wide-reaching policies can have the biggest impact. Personally, I would like to see a global tax on waste generated per capita, increasing annually. In the same way that a global carbon tax would target the biggest emitters, a global waste tax would encourage waste minimisation universally. Viewing waste as a global issue will encourage systems wide thinking. 

Policymakers, businesses, and individuals all have a role in a transition to net zero. By implementing effective waste management policies, we can create a more sustainable future.