On the 24th May 2012 traffic around Parliament Square in London was brought to a standstill by skip wagons protesting against changes to landfill tax charges. The cause of the protests were the innocuous sounding ‘clarification’ of LFT rules by HMRC resulting in certain soils now attracting the full £64/tonne standard rate of tax instead of the previous low rate (£2.50/tonne). The consequence of an immediate hike in landfill charges meant that waste hauliers were seriously out of pocket.
The real root cause dates back to 2008 when the Court of Appeal ruled against HMRC in relation to landfill tax paid for materials used for daily cover and site engineering purposes. The court agreed that the material had not been disposed of as waste and was therefore non taxable. Following this landmark case, the Treasury set aside around £300 million for claims made by waste management companies. Since then the Government has attempted to close this loophole by introducing two rates of landfill tax and the landfill tax (Qualifying Material) Order, which defines material that qualify for the lower LFT rate.
HMRC ‘Clarifications’ and impacts on Contaminated Land
The original clarification (Brief 15/12, May 2012) that caused so much outrage amongst waste hauliers and waste management companies made it more difficult for operators to pay the lower rate of LFT for contaminated soils. In response, the HMRC issued two further clarification documents (Brief 18/12, June 2012) and a document entitled Interim advice on lower rating. These attempted to specifically exclude contaminated soils from qualifying by stating “in respect of rocks and soils, where such materials are contaminated with materials such as asbestos, metal, wood, or contain elevated levels of chemical contaminants (heavy metals, hydrocarbons), they would fall outside the conditions required in the 2011 Order and therefore be liable to the standard rate.”
So how will these changes affect you? The likelihood is that your muck-a-way costs will continue to rise significantly. Furthermore, the standard rate charge increases to £72/tonne from April 2013. However, alternative options do exist and we can help you find a solution!
Regener8 Soil Conversion
Dunton Environmental Ltd can help you avoid the higher costs associated with landfill tax and you may even be able to re-use your soils on site, removing the costs of importing materials. By developing advanced technologies in the field of soils treatment and waste management we are able to provide faster, professional and low cost solutions for remediating contaminated land.
With over 8 years of on-site experience, Dunton Environmental has developed a formula which converts high liability contaminated soil wastes into reusable products. The soil is initially screened then treated according to the chemical nature of the soils (either by accelerated bioremediation or by the addition of Regener8 which utilizes chemical oxidation, chemical reduction and metathesis reactions) into non harmful products. The treated soils are then composted to increase its suitability as a plant growing medium.
This technology and process is compliant with Environmental legislation and meets the requirement of a ‘Best Practice’ site waste management plan. It can also be used to pre-treat contaminated soils prior to landfill to reduce the overall cost of cart way or used to treat heavily contaminated soils to render it suitable for use on site below a capping layer.
Why not book a free EnviroSMART Seminar?
Dunton’s EnviroSMART system will help you remove the waste out of waste management. It is faster, cheaper and simpler. It has been successfully used to assist major house builders and retailers in saving hundreds of thousands of pounds by diverting contaminated soils from landfill, in timescales that worked.
Training seminars are available on request. Our EnviroSMART seminars help educate Clients on remediation and waste management strategies and solutions for soil and waste recycling to reduce their waste disposal costs, saving time and money.
