Waste Management

Plastic Waste

• India is committed to mitigating pollution caused by littered single-use plastics.
• According to a report on Plastic Waste Management released by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, the global average of plastic per capita consumption is 28 kg, and India has a per capita plastic consumption of 11 kg.
• However, as an attempt to reduce pollution caused due to littered plastic waste in the country, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Government of India, notified the Plastic Waste Management Amendment Rules, 2021, on August 12, 2021.
• On July 1, 2022, a ban was imposed on the manufacture, import, stocking, distribution, sale and use of identified single-use plastic items, which have low utility and high littering potential, all across the country.
• The measures will promote a circular economy, reduce the plastic footprint of plastic packaging, promote the development of new alternatives to plastic packaging and provide the next steps for moving towards sustainable plastic packaging by businesses.

Battery Waste

• The Government published the Battery Waste Management Rules, 2022, on August 24, 2022 to ensure environmentally sound management of waste batteries.
• Notifying these rules is a transformative step towards promoting the circular economy.
• New rules will replace Batteries (Management and Handling) Rules, 2001.
• The rules cover all types of batteries, viz. Electric Vehicle batteries, portable batteries, automotive batteries, and industrial batteries.

E waste

The Government notified the E-Waste (Management) Rules, 2022, on November 2, 2022. These rules will replace the E-waste (Management) Rules, 2016, and will be effective from April 1, 2023.

These rules will launch a new Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) regime for e-waste recycling. The salient feature of new rules is as under:

• Applicable to every manufacturer, producer, refurbisher, dismantler, and recycler who must register with CPCB.
• No entity shall carry out any business without registration and not deal with any unregistered entity.
• The authorisation has now been replaced by registration through an online portal, and only manufacturers, producers, refurbishers and recyclers require registration.
• Schedule I has been expanded, and now 106 Electrical and Electronic Equipment (EEE) have been included under the EPR regime.