Ireland's State of the Environment Report 2024

450 Chapter 16: Environmental Policy Implementation and Performance Ireland’s performance on waste and the circular economy Chapter 15 provides a detailed look at Ireland’s progress in managing waste and transitioning to a circular economy. It highlights that, despite ambitious new policies in place, to date there has been little tangible progress on transitioning to a circular economy. Significant recent policy initiatives include the Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy adopted in 2020, the Whole-of-Government Circular Economy Strategy adopted in 2021 and put on a statutory footing via the Circular Economy Act 2022, and the National Waste Management Plan for a Circular Economy 2024-2030, which together provide the policy framework for moving Ireland from a linear to a circular economy. Recent measures to promote recycling include the recovery levy introduced in 2023, the Deposit Return Scheme for plastic drinks bottles and aluminium cans that came into operation in 2024 and the expansion of brown bins to all households being rolled out in 2024. In its latest semester report for Ireland, the Commission notes that Ireland’s recycling, composting and anaerobic digestion levels are still insufficient and that Ireland’s circular material use rate – at 1.8% in 2022 – remains significantly lower than the EU average (11.5%) (EC, 2024). While there are known limitations of using the circular material use rate in an Irish context due to methodological challenges around measuring the consumption and trade of waste for recycling (McCarthy et al. , 2024), Ireland’s Circular Economy Strategy commits to significantly increasing the material use rate both in absolute terms and in comparison with other EU Member States, with the ambition of exceeding the EU average by 2030. Significant improvements in recycling and reductions in consumption will be needed to reach this objective. Topic Box 16.5 shows that if everybody in the world consumed resources at the rate people in Ireland do, the global population would require the equivalent of 3.3 Earths to satisfy its needs. Topic Box 16.5  Ireland’s global footprint – how many Earths? The Global Footprint Network produces information on how many Earths would be needed if everyone on the planet lived like the residents of a particular country. They estimate that, if everybody in the world consumed resources at the rate people in Ireland do, the global population would require the equivalent of 3.3 Earths to satisfy its needs (Global Footprint Network, 2022). Municipal waste generation in Ireland remains high, growing by 14.8% between 2016 and 2021. Over the same period, the quantity of materials recycled has increased at a similar level (15.8%), meaning that Ireland’s recycling rate for municipal waste has essentially stagnated. With just 41% of Ireland’s municipal waste recycled in 2021, urgent action is needed to significantly drive up recycling and reduce waste generation if Ireland is to meet the EU targets of 55% by 2025, 60% by 2030 and 65% by 2035 (EPA, 2023c). While Ireland has made significant progress in reducing disposal to landfill, 16% of municipal waste was disposed to landfill in 2021, meaning that further improvements are needed to meet the EU limit of 10% by 2035. Ireland also remains overly reliant on unpredictable export markets with almost 382,000 tonnes of residual waste sent for incineration abroad in 2022 (EPA, 2023c), which is neither environmentally nor economically sustainable. The government has committed to reducing food waste by 50% by 2030. The latest EPA data estimate that Ireland generated 750,000 tonnes of food waste in 2022, equating to 146 kg per person, which is higher than the EU average of 130 kg per person. There was relatively no change in the total amount of food waste generated in Ireland in 2022 compared with 2021, signalling the need for increased interventions to tackle food waste.