Earlier this year Tolvik issued a series of Briefing Reports on the impact of COVID-19 on the Residual Waste market in the UK.
In the third version of the Briefing Report, released on 29 May 2020, www.tolvik.com/potential-impacts-of-covid-19-on-the-uk-waste-sector/, Tolvik forecasted that the maximum impact of lockdown, on an annualised basis, would be a reduction in Residual Waste tonnages in the UK of 16.9% (23.2Mt vs 27.8Mt for 2019).
Tolvik has recently received preliminary quarterly data from the Environment Agency under a Freedom of Information Act request.
This data includes Q2 2020 (i.e. April – June), which broadly corresponds to the period during which the COVID-19 lockdown was at its peak. When combined with monthly RDF export data, it is estimated that the actual impact of COVID-19 was a reduction in Residual Waste tonnages of 15.6%.
Landfill inputs were down 34% from the average during 2019, whilst EfW inputs were up, largely due to additional EfWs starting operation in late 2019/early 2020.
