Bevan Brittan has scooped a lead role advising Northamptonshire County Council (NCC) on a groundbreaking new form of trading agreement for landfill allowances.

The deal sees NCC join forces with the London Borough of Greenwich on a long-term trading agreement designed to enable both local authorities to manage their landfill arrangements more efficiently. The agreement, which signed in early February, will run until 2020.

The trading agreement was drawn up in line with the Government’s Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme (LATS). The system, which was launched in 2005, allows Waste Disposal Authorities (WDAs) such as NCC to trade, save, bank or borrow the allocation of landfill allowances granted to them (Landfill Allowances) as a result of the European Union Landfill Directive.

The scheme is part of a wider drive by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to help WDAs reduce the amount of biodegradable waste they send to landfill sites.

Defra has encouraged WDAs to engage in strategic long-term planning to make effective use of LATS as part of an overall waste strategy. This has become an increasingly important issue for all WDAs as Defra has now set a fixed £150 penalty per tonne of biodegradable waste if a WDA sends more than its allocation of waste to landfill in any year.

The approach adopted by NCC is unique in combining a long-term commitment to buying Landfill Allowances with flexibility as to the number of Landfill Allowances required in each year. A pricing mechanism has been included which allows both Authorities to achieve a fair price that is representative of the market for Landfill Allowances in the relevant scheme year.

NCC is now considering rolling out the innovative model to include fresh agreements with other WDAs and has held preliminary talks with Defra about sharing their Landfill Allowances know-how.

Bevan Brittan fielded a team that included associate Nadeem Arshad and trainee Kirsty Andrews, both members of the firm’s specialist waste team.

Commenting on the deal, Nadeem said: “NCC have taken an important step in managing their LATS allowances through this innovative trading agreement. More and more WDAs are carefully rethinking their ability to generate savings through the LATS regime and it is great to see one of Bevan Brittan’s key clients taking the lead.”

The latest deal underlines the increasing reputation of Bevan Brittan in the waste and renewables sector with the firm also currently advising NCC on a county-wide Household Waste Recycling Centre rationalisation project as well as acting for both NCC and Milton Keynes on a separate joint waste PFI project.