Recycling Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment

Rates

Environmental Management Costs

Producers have to fund the recycling of WEEE arising from goods they place on the market after 13 August 2005, and also the recycling of all WEEE arising from all goods placed on the market prior to this. Producers must fund the management of this ‘historic waste’ on the basis of their current market share. The WEEE Directive requires Member States to ensure that for a transitional period of eight years (10 years for large household appliances) producers are allowed to show consumers, at the time of sale of new products, the costs of collection, treatment and disposal of historic WEEE in an environmentally sound way.

Visible Environmental Management Costs (vEMCs) show the costs of recycling as approved by the WEEE Register Society Limited, an industry-based national WEEE registration body, which has an independent Committee of Management. These costs will fund the two collective compliance schemes operating in Ireland, WEEE Ireland and the European Recycling Platform, to enable them to pay for the environmentally sound management of all household WEEE taken back by retailers or deposited by members of the public at local authority civic amenity sites.

The vEMCs displayed to consumers cannot exceed the actual costs of recycling. The WEEE Register, the national registration body for producers has verified and issued a schedule of vEMCs to be displayed. A sample of the EMCs, which must be displayed for various products are as follows;

For further information with regard to EMCs you should contact the WEEE Register (address below).

Please note that the EMCs listed above are valid from the 1st June 2008.

Price Display

Prices quoted and displayed to purchasers for any electrical or electronic equipment must include the vEMCs. The price of the product including VAT (exclusive of the EMC) and the EMC must be displayed separately on the shelf edge label or on the item itself.

Retailers must also specify what this cost is for on any invoice, receipt or docket. They do this by stating that this is a ‘Producer Recycling Fund (amount of environmental management cost)’. A notice must be clearly visible where the electrical items are sold stating that ‘The prices of these items include contributions to a producer recycling fund to ensure that waste electrical and electronic equipment is collected and recycled in a responsible manner’.

Product Marking

All producers are obliged to mark their electrical and electronic equipment with a crossed out wheeled bin symbol. This symbolises that the equipment should not be put in a bin destined for landfill when it has reached the end of its life.

Information on disposal of equipment

Retailers are obliged to provide information to the consumer on how they can dispose of the electrical and electronic equipment when it comes to the end of that equipment’s life. Retailers may do this by providing leaflets or signage at the point of sale.

Batteries and contaminated waste

Batteries should be disposed of carefully and not sent to landfill as they are classed as hazardous waste. At present, according to WEEE legislation retailers only need to take batteries, which are contained within electrical or electronic equipment. You should dispose of all other batteries in a local authority civic amenity site.

You can deposit waste batteries at retail outlets for free. Retailers must take back batteries of a type they supply. They do not have to take back batteries of a type they do not supply. For example, retailers will not have to take back a car battery if they only sell batteries suitable for a torch or remote control. You do not need to have bought your battery in that particular shop and you do not have to buy anything from the shop when you are depositing waste batteries.

Retailers are not obliged to accept contaminated waste that would present a health and safety risk to their staff.

You can also deposit waste portable batteries and waste car batteries from privately registered vehicles at local authority civic amenity facilities free of charge.

Civic Amenity Sites

Consumers may bring items of electronic and electrical equipment to Civic Amenity sites to dispose of them free of charge. Civic amenity sites are places where all sorts of recyclable material can be delivered and sorted by consumers and are run by local authorities.

What else can you do to prevent waste from electric and electronic equipment?

• When buying new electronic or electrical items, choose ones that are durable and can be upgraded in the future, if possible. Consider first if a current item of equipment can be upgraded, rather than being completely replaced.
• If an appliance has stopped working, before discarding it, see if it can be repaired.
• In some areas, there are projects that take household furniture and basic electrical equipment such as cookers and fridges and pass them on to low-income households.
• Rather than put unusable small appliances in the bin, take them to the Civic Amenity Site where they can be added to other equipment for recycling. If you have bulky items to be discarded, contact your local authority for further details.
• If your workplace has electronic equipment that is no longer needed, contact your local authority for details of groups redistributing personal computers to the non-profit sector.
• There are a number of dealers that are interested in large quantities (tonnages) of electronic scrap. If you have this kind of waste available, contact your local authority for further information.