Be the waste carrier

• Explain what a waste transfer note is, and why the law asks for one.
• Use an EWC code (the six-digit European Waste Catalogue number that says what a waste is) to describe a load, and spot a hazardous code by its star.
• Explain why hazardous waste travels on a consignment note instead.
• Say who can be held responsible when waste is dumped, using the idea of a duty of care.

Shared with pupils, and printed on their checklist: We are learning to record waste properly when it changes hands, and to spot when it is hazardous.

• I can find the right waste code for a load.
• I can tell from the code whether waste is hazardous, and choose the right form.
• I can explain who could be in trouble if waste is dumped.

• Citizenship, key stage 3: rules and laws, and how they're enforced. Pupils meet a real legal duty, see who it binds, and talk about what happens when someone breaks it.
• Geography, key stage 3: how human activity affects the environment and how natural resources are used. Pupils see why some waste is burnt, some is taken apart, and some needs special treatment.

• 5 minutes. Starter. Ask: "If the school pays someone to take its rubbish and they dump it in a field, who's in trouble?" Take answers, then explain the duty of care.
• 5 minutes. Read out the scene-setter (under How to run it) and share the learning intention. Hand out the scenario card and put the class in groups of two or three: one pupil plays the school, the others the carrier.
• 25 minutes. Groups work through the three loads with the cards, the blank waste transfer note, and the checklist.
• 10 minutes. Plenary. Go through the answers, then ask the plenary questions, from recall to reasoning.
• 5 minutes. Exit task, on the back of the checklist. Pupils tick the "I can" statements they've met.

• For each group: the scenario card (page 5), the card set (pages 6-7, cut up), three copies of the blank waste transfer note (pages 8-9), and the pupil checklist (pages 10-11, printed back to back).
• For you: these notes (pages 1-4) and the answer set (pages 12-14). Don't hand out the answer set.
• Everything prints in black and white on A4.

Read this out to start

Our school is having a big clear-out before the summer holidays. There's an old sofa, three broken laptops, and some tins of paint to get rid of.

Today you are waste carriers. That's the job of the people who are paid to take waste away. The law says every load must be written down before it leaves the school, so you'll fill in the paperwork for each one.

Be careful, because not every load is as simple as it looks.

• Explain the duty of care before you start. Anyone who produces, carries, or handles business waste must pass it only to someone allowed to take it, with a written description. Schools are bound by it like any business.
• Give each group three blank notes, one per load. Most groups will start a note for the laptops or the paint before they find the star. That's the point of the lesson, so let them, and ask what the star means when they get there.
• If a group is stuck on the laptops, point them to the "Not sure? Be safe" card. If they're stuck on the paint, ask what the label on the tin says.
• The sofa is the only load that goes on a waste transfer note. It has a twist of its own, because sofas can contain POPs (persistent organic pollutants, chemicals that last for years in the environment), so it must be burnt in an incinerator.
• In the plenary, come back to the starter. Both the carrier and the school can be in trouble if the waste is dumped, and the note is how anyone finds out who had it.

Everything here is made up: the school, the carrier, the sites, the people, and every number.

The law behind the answers

• The duty of care is in section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. The exemption for householders covers only people throwing out waste from their own homes, so it doesn't reach a school. The government's code of practice names schools as waste producers.
• A waste transfer note must give the waste's code and description, how much there is and how it's held, the time and place of the transfer, the school's SIC code, both parties' names, a waste hierarchy statement, and both signatures. Both keep it for two years.
• Hazardous waste (a code with a star) moves on a hazardous waste consignment note instead. In England the producer keeps its records for three years and the carrier for one year.
• The paint codes are a mirror pair: 20 01 27* applies when the paint holds enough hazardous substances, so it depends on what's in the tin. The electrical codes work differently. 20 01 35* applies when the equipment has a hazardous component inside, such as a battery of a hazardous type or the mercury lamp behind an old screen. Either way, the cards give pupils a clue to decide by.
• Household-type sofas and armchairs that contain POPs must be burnt, whether they come from a home or a business. The guidance's way to rule POPs out is a scan of the foam and fabric for bromine. Nobody has scanned this sofa, so pupils treat it as containing POPs. Such seating stays non-hazardous (20 03 07), so it travels on a transfer note, which must describe it as domestic seating waste containing POPs and list the chemicals, such as DecaBDE, the most common one.
• Paper waste transfer notes are still legal, and so are electronic ones. The government is moving waste records online through a service called Digital Waste Tracking. Receiving sites in England and Wales have had to use it since October 2026, and waste carriers will have to from October 2027. Transfer notes and consignment notes carry on alongside it for now.

• Load 1: the sofa: 20 03 07, waste transfer note, to Maketown Energy Plant. Bulky waste, 20 03 07, which has no star, so it goes on a waste transfer note. A sofa is household-type seating, so the rules for seating that contains POPs (persistent organic pollutants, chemicals that last for years in the environment) apply even though it came from a school: it must be burnt, kept apart from other waste, and described on the note as domestic seating waste containing POPs. 20 03 01 (mixed bin waste) is the decoy.
• Load 2: the laptops: 20 01 35*, consignment note, to Maketown Electricals Recycling. Nobody knows what is in the screens, boards, and batteries. An old screen may be lit by a small mercury lamp, which the Environment Agency's guidance counts as a hazardous component, and GOV.UK's advice is to treat electrical waste as hazardous when you're still unsure. So it's 20 01 35*, and the star means it needs a consignment note. A group that picks 20 01 36 has missed the "Not sure? Be safe" card.
• Load 3: the paint: 20 01 27*, consignment note, to Maketown Hazardous Waste Centre. The flame symbol and the word solvents on the label are the clue, so the code is 20 01 27*, and the star means a consignment note. Paint with no hazardous substances in it would be 20 01 28 and could go on a waste transfer note. The label and the maker's safety data sheet tell you which.

• The laptops and the paint can't go on a waste transfer note, because their codes have a star.
• Each load travels on a hazardous waste consignment note. It records much the same as a transfer note, plus what makes the waste dangerous (for the paint, that it's flammable) and a code that identifies that one movement.
• The school keeps its records for three years. The carrier keeps its records for one year.
• The two loads go to different sites: the laptops to a site that treats old electricals, the paint to a hazardous waste site.

The PDF’s answer set also has the sofa’s waste transfer note filled in, field by field.

Plenary questions

Ask them in this order, from recall to reasoning. Questions 4 to 6 are the ones pupils wrote about on their checklist.

1. What does a star at the end of a waste code tell you? That the waste is hazardous: it could harm people or nature. It needs a consignment note.
2. Which load went on a waste transfer note, and how long do the school and the carrier keep their copies? The sofa. Both keep a copy for two years.
3. The sofa's code has no star. Why can't the carrier take it to landfill? Sofa foam may contain POPs, chemicals that last for years in the environment. Seating that may contain them must be burnt in an incinerator.
4. Why can't the paint go on a waste transfer note? Its code, 20 01 27*, has a star, so it's hazardous. Hazardous waste needs a consignment note instead.
5. The carrier dumps the sofa in a field instead of taking it to the energy plant. Who could be in trouble, and why? The carrier, for dumping waste (fly-tipping). The school could be too, if it didn't check the carrier was registered or didn't fill in the note properly. Everyone who handles waste has a duty of care.
6. Why do you think both people keep a copy of the note for two years? So that if the waste turns up in the wrong place, the note shows who had it, what it was, and where it was meant to go.

Exit task

Exit task: a carrier is collecting an old fridge from the staff room. Write down one thing you would check before you take it, and why.

Any sensible check, with a reason. For example: look up its waste code to see if it has a star, because a hazardous code needs a consignment note; or check the carrier is registered, because the school must only hand waste to someone allowed to take it. (Many old fridges contain gases that make them hazardous, which the class can't know yet, so the reasoning matters more than the answer.)

The codes on the cards

Each one links to its entry in the List of Wastes.

• 20 03 01: Mixed municipal waste
• 20 03 07: Bulky waste
• 20 01 36: Discarded electrical and electronic equipment other than those mentioned in 20 01 21, 20 01 23 and 20 01 35
• 20 01 35*: Discarded electrical and electronic equipment other than those mentioned in 20 01 21 and 20 01 23 containing hazardous components
• 20 01 28: Paint, inks, adhesives and resins other than those mentioned in 20 01 27
• 20 01 27*: Paint, inks, adhesives and resins containing hazardous substances

• Wales: waste transfer notes follow the same law as England. Hazardous waste has its own Welsh regulations, and the consignment note uses the form and code format set by Natural Resources Wales (NRW). Premises that produce or store more than 500 kg of hazardous waste a year must also register with NRW, which England stopped requiring in 2016.
• Scotland: transfer notes come under the Environmental Protection (Duty of Care) (Scotland) Regulations 2014. Hazardous waste is called special waste, and it moves on a consignment note under the Special Waste Regulations 1996 instead. The regulator is SEPA.
• Northern Ireland: transfer notes come under the Controlled Waste (Duty of Care) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2002, explained in the code of practice from the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA), and are kept for two years. Hazardous waste moves on a consignment note with a code issued by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency.
• The POPs seating guidance in these notes is England's. The other nations have their own. Digital Waste Tracking reaches receiving sites in Scotland and Northern Ireland in January 2027. The waste codes are the same in all four nations.

• Environmental Protection Act 1990, section 34 (duty of care), legislation.gov.uk
• Waste duty of care: code of practice, GOV.UK
• The Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2011, regulation 35 (transfer notes), legislation.gov.uk
• Dispose of business or commercial waste: waste transfer notes, GOV.UK
• Hazardous waste: consignment notes, GOV.UK
• Hazardous waste: producers and holders, GOV.UK
• Hazardous waste: carriers, GOV.UK
• The Hazardous Waste (England and Wales) Regulations 2005, legislation.gov.uk
• The Hazardous Waste (England and Wales) (Amendment) Regulations 2016, explanatory note (premises notification ends in England), legislation.gov.uk
• Register or renew as a hazardous waste producer (Wales), Natural Resources Wales
• How to complete a hazardous waste consignment note (Wales), Natural Resources Wales
• The Hazardous Waste (Wales) Regulations 2005, legislation.gov.uk
• Waste classification technical guidance (WM3), mirror entries and Example 6 (WEEE), GOV.UK (Environment Agency)
• Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE): how to classify, GOV.UK
• Manage waste upholstered domestic seating containing POPs, GOV.UK
• Register as a waste carrier, broker or dealer, GOV.UK
• Digital waste tracking: check if you need to report the waste you receive, GOV.UK
• Digital waste tracking service, GOV.UK
• The Environmental Protection (Duty of Care) (Scotland) Regulations 2014, legislation.gov.uk
• The Environmental Protection (Duty of Care) (Scotland) Regulations 2014, regulation 4 (special waste), legislation.gov.uk
• Duty of care code of practice (Northern Ireland, 2016), DAERA
• Hazardous waste (Northern Ireland), DAERA
• National curriculum in England: citizenship programmes of study, GOV.UK
• National curriculum in England: geography programmes of study, GOV.UK