Piles of paperworkWould you prefer to record your waste transfers online instead of having a pile of paperwork? Edoc, a UK-wide system being developed by government and waste industry organisations, goes live in January 2014. It will enable you to do away with paper and create, share, sign and store waste transfer notes online. You will be able to search and retrieve your records quickly and easily and create reports for your business.

 

National electronic duty of care (edoc) programme

About the programme
edoc is a 4 year programme to develop a national, internet-based system to monitor the collection, transportation and disposal of waste materials across the UK.  The programme is being co-financed by the EU LIFE+ programme.

Due to be rolled out from January 2014, it will offer an alternative that will transform the existing paper-based system of waste transfer notes, modernising the way that waste data is collected in the UK and significantly enhancing the ability to extract good quality data for businesses, regulators and government.

Why is the programme necessary?
While the benefits of WTNS are clear, the current paper-based system presents a number of challenges. Over 25 million WTNs are produced every year and need to be stored for at least two years. The cost of creation, storage and retrieval can be very high and often, these WTNs are not completed correctly, making accurate waste monitoring very difficult indeed.

Edoc will seek to address each of these issues and improve the way that business waste is monitored across the UK by creating a large document management system that can be accessed via a web portal. An application programming interface (API) will also be provided to enable companies to integrate directly with their existing waste management systems.

Who will use edoc?
Any UK business involved in the production, collection, transfer or disposal of waste will be able to use edoc. Whether you are a business that produces waste or an operator that collects and transports it, you have to complete WTNs and the benefits of transferring to an online system are clear.

For more information on the edoc programme objectives and milestones, partners, programme updates, and contact details, visit the Environment Agency edoc web page