Lord Henley
DEFRA
Nobel House
17 Smith Square
London SW1P 3JR

19 April 2011

Dear Lord Henley,

Thank you for your letter of February 8th in response to mine of January 19th about the Government's upcoming Review of Waste Policies. I still have concerns, particularly about the role that Energy from Waste (EfW) might yet play in the Government's waste management strategy, which I hope I can persuade you to address.

You rightly point out that the best and most carbon-efficient form of waste management is waste reduction, particularly where food waste is concerned. Some good work is being done to reduce food waste on the part of consumers, such as the Love Food Hate Waste campaign, and I look forward to a greater emphasis being placed on reducing food waste from business, especially the larger supermarket chains. I quite agree that this is a major component of any strategy to reduce carbon emissions and I shall be taking a keen interest in the Government's progress on the issue of waste reduction.

For now, though, I would like to concentrate on the role the Government envisages for the various forms of treatment of biodegradable waste. You list a variety of processes - "anaerobic digestion, pyrolysis, gasification and other forms of recycling and energy from waste" - and my concern is that these energy-deriving treatment methods could be given equal consideration as means of dealing with biodegradable waste.

Whilst all of the aforementioned processes can be effective in reducing methane emissions, some are much more carbon-intensive than others; incineration (or ‘energy from waste', as it is sometimes called) for electricity generation has a much higher carbon profile than anaerobic digestion, for example. I hope that, since the Government aims to make waste management contribute to reducing our overall carbon emissions, policy will naturally discriminate in favour of the least carbon-intensive options.

Will the Government ensure that its new waste strategy includes a system of ranking the various EfW processes in order of their carbon abatement potential - with a presumption in favour of the least carbon-intensive options?

I believe such a framework needs to be more than merely advisory in order to be effective, although I am not suggesting a ‘one size fits all' approach. Local authorities need the freedom to choose waste management strategies (including collection systems) that fit their particular circumstances - urban as opposed to rural, and so forth. Beyond such specific considerations, however, overall Government strategy should expect them to adopt local strategies which offer the largest possible potential for reducing carbon emissions.

The Government has made a welcome pledge to orientate its waste strategy towards the goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. A system of carbon performance indicators within that strategy, incorporating a default comparison with a notional optimal waste management system, would set a series of benchmarks for good practice that local authorities would be able to follow.

I look forward to your response.

Yours sincerely,

Caroline Lucas, MP, Brighton Pavilion

Read DEFRA's reply