Packaging waste

Packaging waste regulations

The Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) Regulations 2007, SI 2007/871, (PRO(PW)R 2017) as updated by the Producer Responsibility Obligations (Packaging Waste) (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2020, apply in Great Britain. They are intended to manage packaging waste and prevent or reduce the impact of packaging and packaging waste on the environment by encouraging minimisation and reuse and by setting recovery and recycling targets. These obligations are part of the extended producer responsibility obligations on producers to ensure that waste derived from their products is kept to a minimum.

The producer responsibility regime for packaging waste is being extended. ‘Extended producer responsibility’ will ultimately replace producer obligations under the PRO(PW)R 2017.

The Environment Act 2021 introduced powers for the government to reform existing producer responsibility schemes and to introduce new schemes in the future. The powers provide for modulated fees that can be used to incentivise producers to design their products with re-use and recycling in mind.

Data collection and data reporting regulations for packaging waste are in place to inform the charging schemes for the draft extended producer responsibility regulations. For more information, see Practice

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Environment weekly highlights—3 July 2025

This week's edition of Environment weekly highlights includes: the UK High Court's decision in the BHP dam collapse battle that BHP could not block Brazilian municipalities from bringing criminal contempt proceedings, with the court ruling there were reasonable grounds to argue the mining giant was in contempt. In addition this week, the UK Green Building Council (UKGBC) has launched a UK Climate Resilience Roadmap, the first guidance of its kind to outline how the UK's built environment is increasingly vulnerable to five key climate hazards, the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) has published a Solar Roadmap outlining over 70 actions to support the deployment of 45–47 GW of solar capacity across the UK by 2030, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has published an update to its May 2025 response to the sandeel Arbitration Tribunal's final ruling in the UK-Sandeel case, Natural England has published its Action Plan for 2025–26 detailing how it will implement its new Strategic Direction, 'Recovering Nature for Growth, Health and Security' and PackUK has published a collection of four key documents related to the Extended Producer Responsibility for Packaging (pEPR) scheme. Further this week, the Environment Agency (EA) has published comprehensive guidance outlining the framework for waste exemptions in England and the National Audit Office (NAO) has published a value for money report, assessing the performance of the UK Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) since its introduction in 2021.

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