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NEW: Industry and internal council papers, seen by BBC, see No Deal Brexit delaying, disrupting and making uneconomic exports of waste to EU relied on by local authorities, leading to more landfill... /1 bbc.co.uk/news/business-…
Defra did some good work on this ensuring bilateral deals with individual regulators in the EU nations to keep the flow of trade... but councils and the industry are concerned about port congestion, slide in pound making the trade uneconomic and possible WTO tariffs too... /2
Environment Agency confirmed: “We are encouraging businesses who export waste to consider & continue to plan alternative options in case of disruption at borders," said standards wouldn’t drop. Plenty of evidence of councils checking that too...
Suez’ Stuart Hayward-Higham: “as a result of a no-deal Brexit, we do know that there'll be some lowering of those environmental performance indicators we are all trying to strive to achieve..one of the outcomes of a no-deal Brexit will mean that we will put more to landfill". /4
reference to the tremendous progress made on reducing landfill from 80% of municipal waste to just 20% - with UK accepting new EU Circular economy target of 10% by 2035 - but with limits on domestic energy from waste plants —> some reverse of this landfill progress only option /5
But where? Environmental Services Association Jacob Hayler points out that this is mainly the South East’s waste being exported to EU, mothballed landfill sites are in North.. not in the south east... so /6
“you can't have [currently exported waste] all just piling up at the docks.. It would have to start being trucked from the ports up to those landfill spaces further up north, and stuck in a hole in the ground. And that's something that we would really like to avoid," ESA’s Hayler
... internal council documents did confirm contractors were looking to divert waste exports to landfill... this is worse for the environment in the places (the North?) where the waste ends up, and will also cost councils tens of millions of pounds./8
Other council #nodealpapers seen by BBC showed councils stockpiling binbags, wheelie bins, fast-tracking purchase of bin lorries ahead of last Brexit deadline. Braintree Council pondering reducing allocations of bin sacks per household to “eke out supplies” /9 
In a Brexit impact assessment Sevenoaks Council mentions that a “park and ride could be used as a temporary site” for waste.. and road congestion “leading to late or no collections will impact on the community stockpiling waste in gardens or streets”. /10
And to answer quiz question - Refuse Derived Fuel or RDF - this is how 3 million tonnes of our black bin waste is currently exported to EU-in what look like giant barbecue lighters, seen here on dock side in Southampton
Medium term clearly need more UK EFW plants - but take years
Medium term clearly need more UK EFW plants - but take years
