RoHS and WEEE overview
Directives 2002/95/EC (RoHS) on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment and 2002/96/EC (WEEE) on waste electrical and electronic equipment are designed to tackle the fast increasing waste stream of electrical and electronic equipment and complements European Union measures on landfill and incineration of waste.
Increased recycling of electrical and electronic equipment will limit the total quantity of waste going to final disposal. Producers have been responsible for taking back and recycling electrical and electronic equipment starting August 13th 2005 in most EU member states. This will provide incentives to design electrical and electronic equipment in an environmentally more efficient way, which takes waste management aspects fully into account. Consumers will be able to return their equipment free of charge. In order to prevent the generation of hazardous waste, the RoHS Directive requires the substitution of various heavy metals (lead, mercury, cadmium, and hexavalent chromium) and brominated flame retardants (polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE)) in electrical and electronic equipment put on the market from 1st July 2006. The geographic scope of both directives is the 25 EU member states. However, other countries are also in the process of developing and implementing similar legislation.
The RoHS directive is a harmonization directive which means it will be implemented in the same way in each EU member state. WEEE, on the other hand, is a minimum directive, which means member states are free to implement stricter requirements in national legislation if they so desire. In practice, this means there will be 25 different versions of the WEEE directive in Europe and each producer has to be aware of the relevant ones in those areas where operations are carried out. A company can choose to handle the requirements of the WEEE directive either individually or through a collective system. Collective systems are so-called Producer Responsibility Organizations (PROs), to which a company can transfer the responsibilities in exchange for a fee.
Terminology
RoHS = Restriction of Hazardous Materials
WEEE = (Recycling of) Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment