Valpak gears up to provide full WEEE compliance service

Valpak is gearing up to become a full compliance scheme under the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Directive.

The Warwickshire-based company has begun transferring compliance experts from its packaging scheme to handle the producer responsibility requirements for members under new regulations expected to come into force in January 2007.

The new regulations will see producers and retailers given legal requirements to fund the collection and recycling of old electrical equipment.

Valpak is by far the largest provider of compliance services for packaging producers in the UK under the packaging producer responsibility system. For waste electronics, it is now changing from a mainly informational service to provide an actual service for electronics producers.

Mike Sadler, head of WEEE compliance at Valpak, said: "We have the taken the pro-active step from pre-compliance to full compliance as we believe it's commercially prudent to start planning as the main issues and obligation requirements become clearer."

The forthcoming regulations for WEEE are currently the subject of a final government consultation (see letsrecycle.com story), which closes on October 17.

Seminars
Valpak is running a series of seminars for retailers and producers, starting next week in Manchester and running through November and December, for companies to learn more about their WEEE obligations.

Mr Sadler said: "The WEEE timeline is very tight and we are helping retailers and producers to be prepared in advance. We are ready for the start of WEEE compliance, we want to make sure that our prospect members are as ready as they can be."

A range of topics to be discussed at the seminars will include financial planning and what is to happen to both household and non-household waste electronics.

Retailers
The seminars will also discuss the proposed distributor takeback scheme, which is to be set up in order to help electrical retailers carry out their obligations to fund collection systems for waste electronics.

The DTI has held meetings in recent weeks to discuss who should operate the distributor takeback deposit scheme, and it is understood an organisation will be appointed soon. Valpak is one of the organisations hoping to run the scheme.

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