HP_POP: Contains POPs above the legal limits
Digital Waste Tracking's code for waste containing regulated POPs above the concentration limits in Annex IV of the POPs Regulation. We read it as the entry for the fifteen POPs that make a waste hazardous, such as PCBs or dioxins. The flame retardants in upholstered seating aren't among them.
What HP_POP means
HP_POP is a code in DEFRA's Digital Waste Tracking service, labelled there as waste that contains regulated persistent organic pollutants (POPs) above the legal limits. It isn't one of the fifteen hazardous properties in Annex III, so you won't find it in WM3's HP list or on a paper consignment note.
The Digital Waste Tracking regulations ask a receiving site to record the letters POP when a waste holds one of fifteen named POPs above the limits in Annex IV of the POPs Regulation. These are the same fifteen that WM3 says make a waste hazardous, and we read HP_POP as the service's code for that entry.
The fifteen POPs and their limits
WM3 says a waste is hazardous if it holds any of these above the limit. There's no test method: it's assessed from what sampling and analysis show the waste contains.
| POP | Limit |
|---|---|
| Dioxins and furans (PCDD/PCDF) | 15 µg/kg, as a toxic equivalent |
| PCBs | 50 mg/kg |
| DDT, chlordane, hexachlorocyclohexanes including lindane, dieldrin, endrin, heptachlor, hexachlorobenzene, chlordecone, aldrin, pentachlorobenzene, mirex, toxaphene and hexabromobiphenyl | 50 mg/kg each |
The flame retardants in old upholstered seating (PBDEs such as decaBDE, and HBCDD) aren't among the fifteen. GOV.UK classes seating containing them as non-hazardous, code 20 03 07, so it travels on a waste transfer note. It still has to be incinerated, and the Digital Waste Tracking record names each POP and its concentration.
Any waste at or above an Annex IV limit is POPs waste, and its POPs must be destroyed or irreversibly transformed, with only narrow exceptions. They can't be recovered or recycled.
What it changes when the waste moves
Waste holding one of the fifteen above its limit is hazardous waste, so in England and Wales it moves on a hazardous waste consignment note. Any waste over an Annex IV limit has to go to a site that will destroy the POPs, and the POPs guide covers the rest, seating included.
On Digital Waste Tracking, the site that receives a hazardous load records its HP codes alongside the EWC code (the six-digit code from the List of Wastes that says what a waste is). We read HP_POP as the service's spelling of that entry; the Environment Agency's guidance for consignee returns calls it POP.
Sources
- WM3: Waste classification technical guidance (v1.2.GB): Appendix C16, pages C54 to C57
- Persistent organic pollutants: Annex IV limits
- GOV.UK: Dispose of waste containing POPs
- GOV.UK: Manage waste upholstered domestic seating containing POPs
- Annex III to the Waste Framework Directive (HP1 to HP15)
- GOV.UK: Hazardous waste consignment notes
- The Digital Waste Tracking (England) Regulations 2026: the paragraphs on hazardous properties and POPs, 15 and 16
This page explains the rules. Check the waste itself against WM3 before it moves.
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CarrierNote is on the GOV.UK software provider list, connected to DEFRA's Digital Waste Tracking service. Receiving sites are in scope from October 2026 and carriers from October 2027, and you can be recording to DEFRA's standard from your first load, whenever you start.