Digital waste tracking for inert recycling, soil and quarry restoration

Muckaway, hardcore and planings arrive by the tipper load, often dozens a day. Each one is a record for Defra within two working days. Soil and stones is the code on eight in ten of these sites.

Who: The operator of a permitted crushing, screening or soil treatment site, a deposit for recovery, or a quarry restoration permit.
Codes: 17 05 04 soil and stones, 17 01 07 mixed rubble, 17 01 01 concrete, 17 03 02 planings.
R or D: R5 for recycling into aggregate or soil. R10 or R5 for a deposit for recovery. R13 to store.
Watch: 17 05 03* is the hazardous twin of 17 05 04. Contaminated soil is a hazardous load.

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What English inert and soil sites took in

Inert transfer and treatment sites and deposit for recovery permits, from their 2024 returns.

Code	What the catalogue calls it	Sites
17 05 04	soil and stones other than those mentioned in 17 05 03	80%
17 01 07	mixtures of concrete, bricks, tiles and ceramics other than those mentioned in 17 01 06	38%
17 01 01	concrete	30%
17 03 02	bituminous mixtures other than those mentioned in 17 03 01	26%
20 02 02	soil and stones (from gardens and parks)	13%
17 01 02	bricks	12%
17 09 04	mixed construction and demolition wastes other than those mentioned in 17 09 01, 17 09 02 and 17 09 03	10%
19 12 12	other wastes (including mixtures of materials) from mechanical treatment of waste other than those mentioned in 19 12 11 (from treating other waste, such as fines)	6%
20 02 01	biodegradable waste (garden and park waste)	4%
19 12 09	minerals (For example,. sand, stones)	4%

"Sites" is the share of the 386 English inert transfer, treatment and deposit for recovery permits that sent the Environment Agency 2024 waste returns and took that code in at least once EA 2024 Waste Data Interrogator. A code an asterisk follows is hazardous.

R5, R10 or R13

R5: recycling inorganic materials. Crushing concrete into aggregate, screening soil.
R10: land treatment benefiting agriculture or ecological improvement.
R13: storing it before it goes on to be recovered elsewhere.

SR2022 No 1, treatment to produce soil and aggregate, names R3, R5, R13. SR2015 No 39, use of waste in a deposit for recovery, names R5, R10, R13. In 2024 returns the tonnes at these sites went under R5 45%, D15 14%, D1 11%, R10 10%, R13 10% WDI 2024. A quarry filled under a landfill permit is a landfill: the landfill guide.

An example record, filled in

A made-up eight-wheeler of muckaway, weighed in.

Box	What goes in it (made-up load)
Date and time it arrived	15/10/2026 09:30:00 (Thursday)
Your reference	The weighbridge ticket or transfer note number, e.g. T-10482
Your site and permit	Example Aggregates, quarry, EX0001XX
Carrier and their number	Example Haulage Ltd, CBDU123456
How it came	Road
Vehicle registration	AB12 CDE
Waste description	Excavated clay and stones from a housing site
EWC code	17 05 04 (typed 170504)
Physical form	Solid
Containers	[LOO] Loose, 0
Weight	18.6 Tonnes, actual
R or D code	R5 for 18.6 tonnes: R5 = 18.6 = Tonnes = No
POPs	No
Hazardous properties	No
Consignment note code	Not needed
Due at Defra by	23:59 on Monday 19 October 2026, two working days after the day it came in

All names and numbers are made up.

Things that catch these sites out

Forty tippers a day. Every one is its own record, with its own vehicle registration. Never one record for the day.
No weighbridge. Estimating by lorry type is allowed if the record says it is an estimate.
The hazardous twins. 17 05 03* soil with dangerous substances and 17 09 03* mixed C&D with dangerous substances are hazardous. The producer classifies the waste; if they say it is contaminated, the asterisked code is right. What a hazardous record needs.
Mobile crushing at someone else's site under a mobile plant permit has its own deployment reference. How deployments work.

Who has to report what

You report what comes in. The duty is on the operator of the permitted site that receives the waste Reg 4(1). One record per load, within two working days of the day after it arrives.
Not what goes out. When a load leaves you for another permitted site, that site reports receiving it. Your outgoing paperwork carries on as before.
Not the producer or the haulier, yet. Carriers, brokers and dealers are planned to come in from October 2027 GOV.UK. What is known about that so far.
Paper carries on. Waste transfer notes, Annex VII forms and hazardous waste consignment notes are still needed where they were before GOV.UK.

Permit or exemption?

This is the question that decides whether you report now.

A permit (numbered like AB1234CD or EPR/AB1234CD) for a site that receives waste: you are in phase 1, from 1 October 2026 in England and Wales. In Scotland and Northern Ireland the date is 1 January 2027.
Only a registered exemption (a WEX number): not phase 1. GOV.UK say exemptions "will be included in a later phase" and have not given a date GOV.UK. How to tell which you hold.
Using waste on your own job under the U1 exemption is an exemption, so not phase 1.

Not sure? The free permit check looks your site up on the Environment Agency's register.

Straight answers

Questions people ask

Do quarries need digital waste tracking?

A quarry with a permit to receive waste, such as for restoration, a deposit for recovery or an inert landfill, does: from 1 October 2026 in England and Wales every load in is reported to Defra within two working days.

What EWC code is muckaway?

Usually 17 05 04, soil and stones that are not hazardous. If the producer says the soil contains dangerous substances it is 17 05 03*, which is hazardous.

Is crushing concrete R5?

Usually, yes: R5 is recycling of other inorganic materials. If you only store it before it goes on, it is R13.

We get forty tippers a day. Can we report them as one?

No. The law asks for one record per load. Many loads can go to Defra in one submission, but each lorry is its own record.

What EWC code is road planings?

17 03 02, bituminous mixtures other than those containing coal tar. Planings containing coal tar are 17 03 01*, which is hazardous.

Want this done for you at the gate?

Byrne Waste Tracking runs in the browser on a phone or computer, with nothing to install. It remembers your carriers and their numbers, offers the waste codes and R or D codes your site uses, checks each load against Defra's rules first, and sends it to Defra automatically once you've linked your Defra account. Byrne Digital Solutions is listed on GOV.UK as a compatible software provider.

£89 per site per month, no contract. Join before 1 November 2026 and nothing is due until 1 November; join from 1 November and you get 14 days free. After that it's £89 a month per site, and there's no card to enter until you start it. No setup fee when you set it up yourself. If a consultant introduces you, any setup fee is agreed through them and you see the amount before you pay anything.

A site in Scotland or Northern Ireland that joins before 1 January 2027 pays nothing until 1 January 2027, the day the duty starts there.

Start free Log a pretend load first

Got a waste consultant? Ask them about Byrne first. Stuck on something here? Email wilf@byrnedigitalsolutions.co.uk - email is the quickest way to reach me, and I reply the same working day.

Digital waste tracking for landfill sitesThe codes landfills take, D1 or D5, and turning a weighbridge ticket into a record.
Digital waste tracking for skip hire yards and transfer stationsThe codes yards really take, R13 or D15, weighing by skip size, and a filled-in example.
Hazardous waste sites: consignment notes and digital waste trackingConsignment notes carry on. Each note is its own record, with the code, HP codes and components.
EWC codes for your type of site, in plain EnglishThe waste codes each kind of site uses most, and how to spot a hazardous one.
Every guideAll the questions customers ask, one page each.