25 August 2026
The Waste Management and Resource Recovery Association of Australia (WMRR) has welcomed the Victorian Parliament’s balanced and evidence-based report into the development and expansion of waste-to-energy infrastructure.
WMRR CEO Gayle Sloan said the committee should be commended for carefully considering extensive and often conflicting evidence and recognising the role modern waste-to-energy facilities must play in managing Victoria’s growing volume of residual waste.
“The committee has done the work. It has listened to communities, industry, regulators and scientific experts. Its report recognises that modern waste-to-energy is not in competition with recycling – it is the necessary next step for genuine residual material that would otherwise be landfilled,” Ms Sloan said.
The report recognises the reality confronting Victoria: the state generated 5.7 million tonnes of residual waste in 2024, this is projected to reach 8.9 million tonnes by 2053, and Victoria is not on track to achieve its target of diverting 80% of waste from landfill by 2030.
The committee’s findings also reinforce the urgency already identified through the Victorian Recycling Infrastructure Plan (VRIP), including increasingly pressing residual-waste infrastructure needs in Melbourne’s south-east.
“The reality is that waste does not disappear because we refuse to build the infrastructure needed to manage it,’ said Ms Sloan.
“Victoria must continue to improve avoidance, reuse, recycling and organics recovery. It must also honestly confront what happens to the millions of tonnes that remain. Without energy recovery, genuine residual waste will continue to be buried in increasingly constrained landfills.”
“It is pleasing to see science and evidence prevail,” Ms Sloan said.
WMRR also strongly supports the committee’s call for national product stewardship for packaging, requiring manufacturers to take greater responsibility for the products they place on the Australian market.
“The waste and resource recovery sector shares the committee’s frustration that governments continue to demand more from the end of the supply chain while doing far too little at the beginning,” Ms Sloan said.
“Industry does not design or manufacture the packaging and products that become residual waste. Yet councils, communities and waste operators are left to manage them – and pay for them – after they have been discarded.”
“Governments must urgently regulate what is placed on the market, establish mandatory design and recycled-content requirements and make producers fund the recovery and management of their products,’ said Ms Sloan. “The costs already exist. The question is whether those costs continue to be socialised through council rates and waste charges or are fairly allocated to the producers that create them.”
While supporting strong regulation, transparent emissions reporting and meaningful community engagement, WMRR cautioned against using the report to impose costly or duplicative obligations unique to waste-to-energy facilities.
“Planning, environmental, health, transport and infrastructure requirements for waste-to-energy facilities must be evidence-based and applied consistently. Best-practice regulation should provide confidence and certainty –it should not become another barrier to delivering essential infrastructure,” Ms Sloan said.
“Victoria already subjects waste-to-energy facilities to a rigorous planning, environmental and licensing process. The statewide cap – which the committee did not recommend removing – adds a further layer of control beyond that applied to comparable waste and industrial infrastructure.”
“Available landfill capacity in Victoria is tightening, waste volumes are growing and the infrastructure planning challenge is particularly acute in Melbourne’s rapidly growing south-east,” said Ms Sloan.
“The Victorian Government’s own infrastructure planning identifies the urgency. It must now provide clear leadership, stable policy and efficient, coordinated approvals so the right infrastructure can be delivered in the right locations.”
“Victoria does not have the luxury of another decade of debate,” Ms Sloan said.
“Modern, regulated waste-to-energy facilities recover energy and materials, reduce reliance on landfill and create skilled local jobs. They are essential to a resilient and integrated waste and resource recovery system.”
WMRR thanks committee Chair Georgie Purcell MLC, committee members and the secretariat for their detailed work and balanced consideration of a complex and important issue.