Under the waste treatment law, what legal responsibilities arise when waste generated at a business is illegally entrusted or treated without permission?

The waste treatment law imposes strict management responsibilities on the entire process from waste discharge to final treatment, and in conclusion, waste treatment law violations may impose criminal responsibility not only on the treator but also on the discharging business operator.

First, according to the waste treatment law, business operators must entrust waste to lawfully permitted treatment operators and bear the obligation to manage and supervise that the treatment process is conducted lawfully.

Therefore, even cases of entrusting waste to unauthorized companies or leaving the treatment route unchecked may be assessed as waste treatment law violations.

Representative types of waste treatment law violations include ① entrusting to unauthorized companies, ② illegal waste dumping, ③ unauthorized incineration, ④ non-compliance with treatment standards, etc., and these acts have different applicable legal provisions, with punishment severity varying depending on the type of violation, including imprisonment or fines.

In particular, when the type of waste falls under designated waste, the punishment severity may be further aggravated.

In addition, waste treatment law violations are not limited to criminal punishment and have a high possibility of leading to administrative measures such as business suspension, permit cancellation, and penalty surcharges at business sites.

For this reason, it is difficult to be exempted from responsibility based solely on the circumstance of "merely entrusting", and whether the duty of care was fulfilled in the entrusting process becomes a key judgment criterion.

Ultimately, to reduce risks related to the waste treatment law, it is important to have a pre-management system in place such as confirming the entrusted company's permits, managing treatment process records, and keeping contracts and handover documents, and when problems occur, organizing the facts at the initial stage and setting the legal response direction is necessary.