Municipal Solid Waste
Municipal Solid Waste – or MSW – is a term more extensively used in the EU and includes Household Waste and any other wastes collected by a Waste Collection Authority, or its agents, such as Municipal Parks and Garden Waste, Beach Cleansing Waste, Commercial Waste and waste resulting from the clearance of Fly-tipped Materials. It can also be used to describe Commercial Waste that are broadly similar in nature to household wastes as outlined in the definition below.
Municipal Waste was originally defined within Directive 1999/31/EC on the landfill of waste but has now been updated and re-defined in Directive 2018/851 amending Directive 2008/98/EC on waste (the Waste Framework Directive). "Municipal waste" now means [1]:
- mixed waste and seperarately collected waste from households, including paper and Cardboard, Glass, Metals, Plastics, bio-waste, wood, textiles, packaging, waste electrical and electronic equipment, waste batteries and accumulators and bulky waste including mattresses and furniture;
- mixed waste and seperately collected waste from other sources, where such waste is similar in nature and composition to waste from households;
Directive 2018/851 also states that Municipal Waste is to be understood as corresponding to the types of waste included in EWC Codes Chapter 15 01 and Chapter 20 (with the exception of codes 20 02 02, 20 03 04 and 20 03 06).
Municipal waste does not include waste from production, agriculture, forestry, fishing, septic tanks and sewage network and treatment, including sewage sludge, end of life vehicles or construction and demolition waste.
This definition is without prejudice to the allocation of responsibilities for waste management between public and private sectors.
The definition of municipal waste in the UK changed in 2010 following negotiations with the EU Commission and the waste community to remove the ambiguity around this term and is now termed ‘Local Authority Collected Municipal Waste’ or ‘Local Authority Collected Waste’.
However, further ambiguity may arise in the future with the introduction of the new terms Non-Household Municipal Waste or NHM which appeared in the most recent Government consultation on Consistency in Recycling Collections in England.