Hazardous waste

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This Overview covers key legislation on hazardous waste relating to England and Wales. This includes the Hazardous Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2005, SI 2005/894 (as variously amended) (HWR 2005), the Hazardous Waste (Wales) Regulations 2005, SI 2005/1806 (as variously amended) (HWR Wales 2005) and the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016, SI 2016/1154 (EPR 2016).

The domestic regulations continue to refer to relevant European Union (EU) legislation which further to provisions in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023, are now referred to as assimilated law; that is, law that was retained from the UK's membership of the EU. For this reason, it is still relevant to refer directly to the EU legislation. However, this does not mean that the EU law directly applies in the UK (it does not) but does continue to help define and describe aspects of the domestic law.

The Overview describes how hazardous waste is classified and where to find the rules governing its collection, transport and disposal.

Hazardous waste generally refers to waste which could cause harm to the environment

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