Dive Brief:

• With a new election on the horizon in the United Kingdom, Remondis UK Managing Director Marcus Bauer is calling for changes to enable the UK to harness energy's full power. This is something it cannot do now, said the leader of the waste management company with a presence in 23 European states, Africa, Asia, and Australia.
• Currently, the UK exports waste-to-energy jobs such as generating refuse-derived fuel and solid recovered fuel. They lack capabilities due to insufficient policies to ensure knowledge and resources to work with water streams, and to help consumers reuse, repurpose and recycle, said Bauer.
• If policies are not in place soon, "we will not only be unable to meet our waste targets by 2020, but we’ll lose our standing within the European marketplace," said Bauer.

Dive Insight:

While a 2015 Frost & Sullivan report found the UK leads the market in tidal energy solutions, the region greatly lacks strong footing in waste management. Becoming better positioned will require resources, knowledge, infrastructure, and finances.

"At Remondis UK, we are lucky to be able to send our clients’ waste to other Remondis-owned plants across the globe," said Bauer, citing as one of several examples their German plant, LÜnen, which takes in non-hazardous powders for the production of Radibin.

"However, this ability [to penetrate global markets] is currently an exception rather than the norm in the UK. This shouldn’t be the case … we need to have the space and investment to process waste in a way that can help meet energy demands, as well as create completely new products for use in manufacturing and construction," said Bauer.