Electrical and Electronic Equipment Recycling
What is WEEE and RoHS?
Waste of electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) such as computers, TV-sets, fridges and cell phones is one the fastest growing waste streams in the EU.
To address these problems two pieces of legislation have been put in place: The Directive on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE Directive) and the Directive on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS Directive).
The WEEE Directive (Directive 2002/96/EC) provided for the creation of collection schemes where consumers return their WEEE free of charge. These schemes aim to increase the recycling of WEEE and/or re-use.
EU legislation restricting the use of hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS Directive 2002/95/EC). The legislation requires heavy metals such as lead, mercury, cadmium, and hexavalent chromium and flame retardants such as polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) or polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE) to be substituted by safer alternatives.
Furthermore, the responsibilities for manufacturers, dealers and consumers are defined clearly.
What is STEPCRAFT doing to meet the directives?
We established two provisions to achieve the objectives:
- STEPCRAFT has been registered at Stiftung Elektro-Altgeräte Register (EAR) with Reg.-No. DE94222108. This organization is a central place for all manufacturers and coordinates the resourcing of waste containers as well as the collection of equipment from the public waste disposal authority.
- Our obligation to take back the equipment will be managed with our partners Bitkom Servicegesellschaft mbH and European Recycling Platform (ERP).
How do I know that a device meets the WEEE directive?
All electrical and electronic equipment placed in the EU market has to labelled with the following symbol:
Devices with this label are not intended to be disposed via the residual waste. The responsible producer or the importer respectively has to take of the recycling.
Batteries & Accumulators
Batteries and accumulators play an essential role to ensure that many daily-used products, appliances and services work properly, constituting an indispensable energy source in our society.
The EU legislation on waste batteries is embodied in the Batteries Directive. It intends to contribute to the protection, preservation and improvement of the quality of the environment by minimising the negative impact of batteries and accumulators and waste batteries and accumulators.
Batteries and accumulators are not intended to be disposed via the residual waste. Used batteries and accumulators have to disposed from the public waste disposal authority.
By law end-users are required to return used batteries and accumulators. Disposal through the household waste is prohibited!
Batteries containing contaminant material are labelled with the following symbol, which indicate the ban on disposal through the household waste:
The declarations for the decisive heavy metal are: Cd = cadmium, Hg = mercury, Pb = lead.
You thereby fulfill your legal obligations and make a contribution to environmental protection!