The European Commission has proposed a full ban on some of the most commonly used and littered disposable plastic products in Europe, including single-use cutlery, plates, drinks stirrers, straws, cotton buds and sticks for balloons.

Duracell’s Big Battery Hunt aims to highlight the high levels of battery waste in the UK and encourage wider recycling by working with schools across the country.

The final legislative hurdle to creating a more resource efficient Europe has been overcome after the EU Council approved the EU’s Circular Economy Package (CEP) in Brussels on Tuesday.

UK compliance schemes for waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) have welcomed the government’s response to its consultation on proposed amendments to the UK WEEE Regulations 2013, with actions to be taken forward including a more equitable sharing of the costs of WEEE collection.

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has presented the final draft of his London Environment Strategy to the London Assembly for consideration, with targets such as becoming a zero-carbon city and reducing the capital’s food waste by 50 per cent by 2030 among the proposals in the revised document.

A huge fire at the Pepperhill HWRC in Kent needed eight fire engines at its height to get it under control - and the site looks to be closed until at least August.

The UK’s food waste data, setting out how much food is consumed, recycled and wasted across the country, has been restated by WRAP using new international standards of measurement, resulting in a reduction in the figure for overall household food waste.

Supermarket chain Iceland has added another first to its growing list of actions against plastic packaging with the news that it has installed a reverse vending machine for plastic bottles in one of its London stores, the first UK supermarket to do so.

UK supermarket chain Morrisons has published its food waste figures for the first time, revealing that 11,000 tonnes of food went to waste from its stores in 2017/18, while its food waste reduction schemes go from strength to strength.

One of the UK’s key plastic bottle producers is set to use 51 per cent recycled content in all its bottles by September and wants to move to 100 per cent.