Current status: Answered by Gillian Martin on 12 March 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what estimate it has made of the cost to (a) local authorities and (b) businesses in Scotland of including incineration as part of the UK Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) in 2028.
The UK ETS is jointly governed by the UK ETS Authority (‘the Authority'), comprising Scottish, UK and Welsh Governments and the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs in Northern Ireland.
The Authority is currently in the process of analysing the results from a recent consultation and developing policy positions. Following this period of analysis, an Authority response will be published in due course, which will provide further details on the outcome of the consultation and policy positions for all Scottish partners.
We are aware that Scottish local authorities (LAs) are in a different position to the rest of the UK, given the introduction of the ban on landfilling biodegradable municipal waste, due to come into force on 31 December 2025. This differing position for Scottish partners is foremost in our consideration of related policies in this area.
In order to reflect this, a provisional analysis set out in the analytical annex of the recent consultation noted that if all household waste that currently goes to landfill in Scotland was to be redirected to incineration because of the landfill ban, total costs for all Scottish LAs could increase to £40million.
The Scottish Government is committed to continuing to working with COSLA on future ETS cost projections. We continue to work closely with Local Authorities, through our SG-LG group, on circular economy related issues.