Environmental Protection Act 1990

Part II of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 (EPA 90) contains the main regulatory controls regarding waste on land. It sets out the local authorities’ responsibilities to collect and arrange for the disposal of municipal waste and specifies the key offences of carrying out unlicensed waste management activities dealing with waste in a way, which harms human health or the environment.

The EPA 90 imposed a Duty of Care on waste producers and made further provisions in relation to Controlled Waste (s75). The waste management licensing regime introduced in the EPA 90 has since been phased out and is now regulated under the Environmental Permitting regime introduced in the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2010, as amended.

With regards to waste, the EPA 1990 replaced the provisions for waste in the Control of Pollution Act 1974 (CoPA 74) and provided a framework to increase the control over waste from ‘cradle to grave’. The Act and subsequent regulations brought about a change in the concept from waste disposal, as described in CoPA 74 to ‘waste management’. The new system aimed to bring about a fundamental change in the way wastes were disposed of with greater emphasis placed on techniques of waste management .