Crushing or grinding waste tiles or other ceramics
What you must do
If you are crushing or grinding waste bricks, tiles, concrete with machinery designed for the purpose, then you may need:
- in Northern Ireland, a waste management licence, registered exemption or part C pollution prevention and control (PPC) permit
- in Scotland, an EASR authorisation
In Northern Ireland, you may also need a permit, licence or exemption if you store waste tiles prior to crushing or grinding on site.
In Northern Ireland, the exemption for crushing and grinding would be a paragraph 24 exemption.
If you have an exemption, you must comply with the exemption conditions.
You will need to register this exemption with the Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA).
You must still ensure that your activity does not:
- endanger human health or cause pollution to water, air or soil
- cause a risk to plants or animals
- cause a nuisance in terms of noise, dust, fumes, smoke or odour
- adversely affect the countryside or places of special interest.
In Scotland, the type of authorisation you require depends on the scale, complexity and risk of the activity carried out.
Crushing and screening of designated minerals, or of waste, bricks, tiles and concrete may be carried out under a General Binding Rule (GBR), meaning that you do not need to apply to SEPA for authorisation if you follow the rules.
Note: Carrying out this activity on demolition sites restricts the activity to the place where the recovered aggregate is produced, or to be used.
Other crushing or grinding activities not covered by the GBR will likely need an EASR registration or permit