Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE)

12 Key excerpts on "Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE)"

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  Conversion of Large Scale Wastes into Value-added Products

  • Justin S.J. Hargreaves, Ian D. Pulford, Malini Balakrishnan, Vidya S. Batra(Authors)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  107 4 Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) I.D. Pulford Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) is a rapidly growing category of waste material, which has been of particular concern over the last decade due to risks to human health and environmental contamination resulting from some of the toxic components used in its manufacture. This has been especially the case in countries of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), where the market for such goods is continually inundated with new models and therefore, turnover rates, and hence disposal rates, are high. Legislation has been quickly put in place in many of these countries, setting targets for collection, recycling, and disposal of WEEE. Developing countries are rapidly catching up in terms of WEEE use, and some have put legislation in place. However, these countries are faced with the problems of the importing of old equipment, which often contains higher CONTENTS 4.1 Legislation Dealing with WEEE .................................................................. 108 4.1.1 European Union (EU) ....................................................................... 108 4.1.2 United States of America .................................................................. 112 4.1.3 India .................................................................................................. 112 4.1.4 China ................................................................................................. 113 4.1.5 Developing Countries ....................................................................... 113 4.2 Production of WEEE .................................................................................... 114 4.3 Composition of WEEE and Potential for Recovery and Recycling ............. 115 4.4 Recycling Processes ......................................................................................

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  Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Recycling

  Aqueous Recovery Methods

  • Francesco Vegliò, Ionela Birloaga(Authors)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • Woodhead Publishing

    (Publisher)

  [3] . Despite all the legislative efforts to establish recycling and environmental friendly waste management efforts, the majority of resources today are lost. Several causes have been identified: firstly, insufficient collection efforts; secondly, partly inappropriate recycling technologies; thirdly, and above all, large and often illegal exports of waste into regions with no or inappropriate recycling infrastructures in place. Large emissions of hazardous substances are associated with this. In order to explore and complete an appropriate and thorough system to recover metals and nonmetals from waste printed circuit boards (WPCBs) from an industrial applications viewpoint, this chapter reviews and analyzes the state-of-art, best available technologies that are currently used in the e-waste/PCB recycling industry. Then, an integrated technological route, including metal enrichment and precious metal (PM) recovery, is proposed. Finally, in order to promote the development of metal recovery from WPCBs, some improvements and recommendations in techniques and future trends are also put forward.

  3.2 Definition and classification of e-waste

  There is no standard definition for WEEE or e-waste, which comprises various forms of EEE that have no value to their owners. Any household or business item with circuitry or electrical components with power or battery supply is defined as EEE according to Solving the E-Waste Problem (StEP) Initiative White Paper. The reported definitions of e-waste in literature include that in the European WEEE Directive: “EEE which is waste… including all electronic components (ECs), subassemblies and consumables, which are part of the product at the time of discarding.” WEEE and e-waste are divided into 10 categories based on European WEEE directives [4 ,5] . Basel Action Network gives the following definition: “E-waste encompasses a broad and growing range of electronic devices ranging from large household devices such as refrigerators, air conditioners, cell phones, personal stereos, and consumers electronics to computers which have been discarded by their users” [6] . StEP defines e-waste as: “E-Waste is a term used to cover items of all types of EEE and its parts that have been discarded by the owner as waste without the intention of reuse” [7] .

  3.3 Fundamentals and significance of e-waste and e-waste recycling (amounts and compositions)

  E-waste is one of the fastest-growing waste streams in the world and it has been estimated that these items already constitute about 8% of municipal waste [8] . Therefore, e-waste represents a rapidly growing disposal problem worldwide. According to the United Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (UNI-IAS) The Global E-Waste Monitor Report, 41.8 Mt e-waste was produced and around 6.5 Mt of e-waste was reported as formally treated by national take-back systems globally in 2014. In 2014, global average e-waste generated per inhabitant was 5.9 kg. The rate of e-waste generation is increasing by 10% every year [9] . Most of the e-waste was generated in Asia: 16 Mt in 2014. This was 3.7 kg for each inhabitant. The highest per inhabitant e-waste quantity (15.6 kg/inhabitant) was generated in Europe [10] . In Europe, e-waste is generated at a rate that increases by 16%–28% every 5 years. E-waste amounts to 5–30 kg per person per year and grows three times faster than the municipal waste [1 ,11 ,12] . Due to the globally increased sales, the manufacturing of EEE is a major demand sector for PMs (Au, and Ag), platinum group (PGM), and special/scarce metals (SMs) (Se, Te, Bi, Sb, and In) with strong further growth potential [13] . In fact, after the use phase, the WEEE could be utilized as an important source to recover these “trace elements” [14]

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  Electronic Waste Management and Treatment Technology

  • Majeti Narasimha Vara Prasad, Meththika Vithanage(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Butterworth-Heinemann

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 1

  Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE): Flows, Quantities, and Management—A Global Scenario

  Florin-Constantin Mihai⁎ ; Maria-Grazie Gnoni† ; Christia Meidiana‡ ; Chukwunonye Ezeah§ ; Valerio Elia†     

  ⁎ Department of Research, Faculty of Geography and Geology, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iasi, Iasi, Romania

  † Department of Innovation Engineering, University of Salento, Campus Ecotekne, Lecce, Italy

  ‡ Department of Regional and Urban Planning, Faculty of Engineering, Brawijaya University, Malang, Indonesia

  § Department of Civil Engineering, Alex Ekwueme Federal University, Ndufu-Alike, Ikwo, Nigeria

  Abstract

  This chapter aims to reveal the geographies of E-waste flows at global and national levels based on waste statistics data and thematic cartography. Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) management practices are examined for each major geographical area respectively: Europe, North America, Latin America and the Caribbean, South America, Africa, Asia, and Oceania. Pollution and public health threats associated with improper E-waste management practices is a crucial environmental issue, particularly in emerging economies. Generation, collection, treatment, recycling, and recovery activities of WEEE are analyzed within each geographical area. The formal and informal sectors are further investigated, discussing the gaps and different prospects in development of sustainable E-waste management systems across developing and developed countries.

  Keywords

  E-waste/WEEE; Waste management; Recycling; Pollution; Sustainability; Informal sector; Spatial analysis; Public health

  1 Introduction

  Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE), known also as E-waste, is an emerging waste stream on a global level due to the development of electronic products consumption. It holds great challenges for both industrialized and developing countries. Improper handling of E-waste causes severe pollution and public health issues associated with dismantling activities that are frequently performed in poor conditions. Open burning and open dump practices are the worst options usually adopted by countries without a proper legislation and lack of basic waste management services. The illegal dumping practice of WEEE occurs even in developed countries due to the poor environmental law enforcement of local and regional authorities. At the global level, 8.9 million metric tons (Mt) of E-waste is documented to be collected and recycled, which corresponds to 20% of all the E-waste generated in 2016 (44.7 million Mt) while 1.7 million Mt are thrown into the residual waste in higher-income countries and are likely to be incinerated or landfilled (Baldé et al., 2017 ). In 2016, the global amount of E-waste generated was double than those generated in 2005 calculated at 20 million Mt by Bastiaan et al. (2010)

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  Management of Electronic Waste

  Resource Recovery, Technology and Regulation

  • Anshu Priya(Author)
  • 2023(Publication Date)
  • Wiley

    (Publisher)

  Keywords E-waste; E-waste generation; E-waste management; Treatment Abbreviations WEEE Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment EoL End of Service Life EEE Electrical and Electronic Equipment Management of Electronic Waste: Resource Recovery, Technology and Regulation, First Edition. Edited by Anshu Priya. © 2024 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Published 2024 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 40 3 Generation, Composition, Collection, and Treatment of E-Waste USA United States of America EU European Union Mt Million Tonnes USD United States Dollar TBS Take-Back System EPR Extended Producer Responsibility GDP Gross Domestic Product UN United Nations NGO Non-governmental Organizations ECR Extended Consumer Responsibility PCB Plastic Circuit Board ROHS Restriction of Hazardous Substance 3.1 Introduction The generation of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) has increased over the last few decades, which ultimately poses a serious challenge to the safety of the environment. The term e-waste or WEEE generally includes electrical and electronic instruments and consumables that have been utilized in their service life as transferring or generating signals and are disposed of at the EoL (Ranasinghe & Athapattu, 2020). According to SteP, EEEs that are used in offices and households as essential or luxurious gadgets and discarded at the EoL period without any further refabrication or reuse are classified as e-waste (Step Initiative %J Bonn, G. S. 2014). Nowadays, the generation rate of WEEE is higher than municipal solid waste, and about 43.8 million tonnes (Mt) of WEEE generation was recorded only in 2015 (Baldé et al., 2017). Moreover, Baldé et al. (Baldé et al., 2017) reported that in 2016, about 44.7 Mt of e-waste was generated with a per capita consumption of 6.1 kg per year, where Asia contributed the highest portion (∼41%) and the United States of America (USA) and European Union (EU) generated ∼29% and ∼27%, respectively.

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  Sustainable Resource Recovery and Zero Waste Approaches

  • Mohammad Taherzadeh, Kim Bolton, Jonathan Wong, Ashok Pandey(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Elsevier

    (Publisher)

  Chapter 17

  Waste Electric and Electronic Equipment

  Current Legislations, Waste Management, and Recycling of Energy, Materials, and Feedstocks

  Panagiotis Evangelopoulos, PhD , Efthymios Kantarelis, PhD , and Weihong Yang, PhD

  Abstract

  Waste electric and electronic equipment (WEEE) has been a cause of concern in the past decades due to their complex composition, their low recycling rates, and, of course, their increasing volumes. This chapter summarizes the main challenges that have to be faced and the opportunities relying on the proper management of this waste fraction. The current legislations existing globally are stated together with goals for recycling on the different subcategories of WEEE. Then the composition is analyzed for evaluating the potential improvement of the current systems. Finally, a deep literary review on the existing technologies as well as trends of research during the past years is also presented.

  Keywords

  Dehalogenation; e-waste; Feedstock recycling; Mechanical recycling; Pyrolysis; WEEE

  Introduction

  As innovation in technology progresses and the innovation cycles become even shorter, the production of electronic equipment increases and its replacement accelerates, which makes electric and electronic equipment (EEE) a rapidly growing source of waste.

  The United Nations University has estimated that only for the year 2014, 41.8

   

  million tons of electronic waste (e-waste) was generated, which can become a serious risk for living organisms and the environment [1] . It has also been recorded that the increasing rate has reached 3.0%–5.0% or even higher every year, which is approximately three times faster than the conventional municipal solid waste stream [1 ,2

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  E-Waste Management

  From Waste to Resource

  • Klaus Hieronymi, Ramzy Kahhat, Eric Williams, Klaus Hieronymi, Ramzy Kahhat, Eric Williams(Authors)
  • 2012(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  1ELECTRONIC WASTE

  Environment and Society

  Ramzy Kahhat DEPARTMENT OF ENGINEERING, PONTIFICIA UNIVERSIDAD CATÓLICA DEL PERÚ

  1.1 Introduction

  Electronics equipment significantly influences the way societies relate, and it is impossible to ignore the vast positive impacts of electronics use by society. Nevertheless, important concerns also exist related to the flow of electronics deemed obsolete by consumers (e.g. households, corporations, public agencies, schools) all over the world. These concerns intensify as the manufacturing and adoption rate, triggered by technological development of these devices, increases around the world. For example, the number of mobile phones per capita in the United States and China increased 139% and 725% from 2000 to 2009, respectively (1).

  Compared to expenditures on product development, marketing, and sales, a smaller amount of resources has been devoted to the end-of-use management of electronic equipment, such as reuse, recycling, and landfilling. In the last two decades, some countries and regions have focused on the management of this complex waste stream. The oldest and probably most successful electronic waste (e-waste) or waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) system is the one found in Switzerland, with recycling rates of approximately 9.8 kg of e-waste per person per year (2). SWICO (Swiss Association for Information, Communication and Organization Technology) and SENS (Swiss Foundation for Waste Management), the two e-waste systems in the country, collect and recycle a vast portfolio of electronics, including information technology (IT) and office equipment products (SWICO) and home appliances (SENS) (2, 3). Moreover, with the implementation of the WEEE Directive and under the principle of extended producer responsibility (EPR), the members of the European Union (EU) have been adopting regulations to properly manage e-waste (4). The overall goals of the WEEE regulations include improvement of equipment design, collection at the end of use, environmentally sound treatment and material recovery at the end of life (EoL), and consumer awareness. The original recycling rate target for the WEEE Directive is 4 kg per person per year, which includes a vast range of products: large and small household appliances, IT and telecommunication products, and consumer equipment (4). Although enforcement started in 2003, the implementation timeframe for the WEEE regulation varied from country to country on the basis of factors such as negotiations with stakeholders and transfer from previous country-specific WEEE regulations to the EU WEEE (5). In Asia, Japan and South Korea have vast experience managing e-waste, including televisions (TVs), refrigerators, washing machines, air conditioners, and computers (6, 7). In North America, several American states and Canadian provinces have e-waste programs, including California, Maine, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Ontario, and Saskatchewan, and many other North American locations are in the process of adopting e-waste collection and recycling systems (6, 8). Following the lead of the above-mentioned e-waste management systems and in some cases learning from past experiences, other countries around the world have or plan to adopt strategies to handle e-waste. For example, Thailand is currently developing an e-waste management system that will potentially increase e-waste recycling in the formal domestic sector (9).

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  Introduction to Waste Management

  A Textbook

  • Syed E. Hasan(Author)
  • 2022(Publication Date)
  • Wiley

    (Publisher)

  All electronic products contain toxic metals and/or toxic chemicals that meet USEPA’s criteria of characteristic or listed hazard- ous substance. So, the discarded e-waste becomes hazardous waste (see Chapter 5 for details). The USEPA defines e-waste as consumer electronic products, such as computers, mobile phones, tab- lets, fax, copying machines, electronic game devices, and entertainment devices that are nearing the end of their useful life, are discarded, or given to a recycler. Large appliances, refrigerators, washing machines, cooking range, air conditioners, etc., are excluded. However, with the increas- ing use of microchips, permanent Nd-alloy magnets, and/or sensors in these appliances, and other electronic equipment, they all should be included in the definition of e-waste. 8.1.2.2 European Union The EU uses the term e-waste for waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) and includes a wide variety of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) including large and small appliances, lamps, air conditioners, heat pumps, dispensing machines, etc. 8.1.2.3 United Nations The United Nations uses EEE in its definition of e-waste and, like the EU, includes air condition- ers, refrigerators, washing machines, dryers, TVs, computers, mobile phones, and many other household and business equipment with circuitry or electrical components that use electricity or battery to operate. Under the provision of the Basel Convention, e-waste is regulated as hazardous waste for the purpose of controlling its movement across national borders. Despite the absence of a uniform definition of e-waste, the recent trend has shown that the UN definition has been accepted by a majority of the countries with the exception of the US. In this book, we will use UN’s definition to include all EEE, including large appliances, kettles, toasters, etc., as listed in Table 8.2.

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  Element Recovery and Sustainability

  • Andrew Hunt(Author)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Royal Society of Chemistry

    (Publisher)

  Thus, modern day EEE is both resource intensive and resource wasteful. Robinson estimates approximately one billion computers will be out of use or changed in the next few years. 9 RSC Green Chemistry No. 22 Element Recovery and Sustainability Edited by Andrew J. Hunt r The Royal Society of Chemistry 2013 Published by the Royal Society of Chemistry, www.rsc.org 207 Globally, WEEE is estimated at 40 million metric tonnes per year and predicted to rise to approximately 60 million metric tonnes by 2013. 10–12 Computer-derived WEEE is expected to increase by almost 300% from 2007 to 2020 in South Africa and China and by a staggering 500% in India. 12 WEEE is the fastest growing segment of municipal solid waste (MSW) accounting for 3–5% of incoming materials. The United States of America (USA) and China are the biggest producers of WEEE, generating approximately 3 million and 2.3 million tonnes, respectively. In the EU-27, Norway and Switzerland, WEEE is estimated to increase by 11% from 2008–2014 owing to rapid technological advancement accompanied by reduced prices. 12 The volume of WEEE in circulation is based on the average life cycle or obsolescence rate of electrical and electronic equipment, which is cultural and geographic-dependent. 13–16 The average life cycle or obsolescence rate is defined as the sum of three parts: 12 1 active life–the number of years an electrical/electronic item can be effectively used; 2 passive life–the period in which it can be refurbished or reused, and; 3 storage–constitutes both storage time before disposal and storage time at repair shops prior to dismantling. The average life cycle or obsolescence rate of electrical and electronic equipment in developed nations is generally equivalent to ‘‘active life’’, while in developing and emerging countries it is a sum of active life, passive life and storage.

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  Integrated Waste Management

  Volume II

  • Sunil Kumar(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • IntechOpen

    (Publisher)

  For a thorough discussion on WEEE management practices in various countries see Ongondo et al. (2011a). It is clear from the preceding discussions that strategies to effectively deal with WEEE have still not been perfected. Despite the efforts by various countries to deal with the challenge of Are WEEE in Control? Rethinking Strategies for Managing Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment 365 Country Generation (tonnes/year) Reported discarded items Collection & treatment routes Germany 1.1 million (2005) Domestic WEEE Designated collection points, retailers takeback UK 940K (2003) Domestic WEEE Designated collection points, retailers takeback Switzerland 66,042 (2003) Diverse range of WEEE National takeback programmes China 2.21 million (2007) Computers, printers, refrigerators, mobile phones, TVs Mostly informal collection and recycling India 439K (2007) Computers, printers, refrigerators, mobile phones, TVs Informal and formal Japan 860K (2005) TVs, air conditioners, washin g machines, refrigerators Collection via retailers Nigeria 12.5K (2001-06) Mobile phones chargers & batteries Informal Kenya 7,350 (2007) Computers, printers, refrigerators, mobile phones, TVs Informal South Africa 59.6K (2007) Computers, printers, refrigerators, mobile phones, TVs Informal and formal Argentina 100K Excludes white goods, TVs and some consumer electronics Small number of takeback schemes, municipal waste services Brazil 679K Mobile and fixed phones, TVs, PCs, radios, washing machines, refrigerators and freezers Municipalities, recyclable waste collectors USA 2.25 million (2007) TVs, mobile phones, computer products Municipal waste services; a number of voluntary schemes Canada 86K (2002) Consumer equipment, kitchen and household appliances A number of voluntary schemes Australia - Computers, TVs, mobile phones and fluorescent lamps Proposed national recycling scheme from 2011; voluntary takeback Table 1.

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  Metal Recovery from Electronic Waste: Biological Versus Chemical Leaching for Recovery of Copper and Gold

  • Arda Işildar(Author)
  • 2018(Publication Date)
  • CRC Press

    (Publisher)

  Electronic waste refers to discarded electrical and electronic equipment that are at the end of their economic life span and no longer be used by consumers. It is commonly shortened as e-waste, and referred to as Waste Electric and Electronic Equipment (WEEE). All WEEE are grouped into 10 primary categories, according to the WEEE Directive by the European Commission (2012/19/EU). These 10 major product groups are classified per product type and legislative relevant categories. They are broken down into 58 sub-categories, approximately 900 products where all devices are represented. They are also linked to 5 to 7 collection categories, which exists in actual WEEE practice (Wang et al., 2012a).

  2.1.2  Global and regional WEEE generation

  WEEE is the fastest-growing type of solid waste, occupying an increasing fraction of the global municipal waste (Kiddee et al., 2013). This is particularly prevalent in the developed economies, with saturated electrical and electronic equipment (EEE) markets, where WEEE makes up to 8% of the municipal waste (Robinson, 2009). Generation of WEEE has exponentially increased, is associated to rapid technological innovations combined with demand growth in the electronics sector. In addition, decreasing economic lifespan of electronic devices (Zhang et al., 2012a), lack of international consensus on WEEE management (Friege, 2012), and inadequate user awareness play a role in an unprecedented increase of WEEE generation. The lifespan of electrical and electronic devices decreased from an average of 8 years to 2 years for large EEE and 4 years to 9 months for mobile phones, from 2000 to 2010, respectively (Kasper et al., 2011; Zhang et al., 2012a). Decreased economic use is particularly the case for urban areas where the population density is very high (Zeng et al., 2015). These issues, coupled with an ever-increasing spectrum of devices make the generation of WEEE an alarming issue.

  The quantification of WEEE volumes is prerequisite for the development of sustainable solutions. Challenges include the lack of data accuracy and the dynamic behavior of the flows and their constituents (Schluep et al., 2013). WEEE quantification is particularly cumbersome in developing countries as informal waste management systems are poorly documented (Wang et al., 2013). Global WEEE generation reached 41.8 million tons (Mt) in 2014, and forecasted to rise to 50 million tons in 2018 (Baldé et al., 2015). An overview of EEE put on market, WEEE generation, and their projections until 2020 per country are given in Table 2-1

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  Handbook of Electronic Waste Management

  International Best Practices and Case Studies

  • Majeti Narasimha Var Prasad, Meththika Vithanage, Anwesha Borthakur, Majeti Narasimha Vara Prasad(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Butterworth-Heinemann

    (Publisher)

  The first constitutional process is carried out in August 2013, where the first version of the draft law enters the chamber of deputies, to establish a national legal framework. Prior to this, waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) was regulated under instruments referred mainly to solid waste. The competence of their management was the responsibility of the Ministry of Health, under Supreme Decree No. 148/2004, establishing the Health Regulations on the Management of Hazardous Waste.

  The application of this decree did not adequately consider the social and economic potential of WEEE, because the standards requested did not correspond to the necessary conditions for the specific treatment of the devices. Therefore material recovery was costly. These requirements enabled only a limited number of companies to respond to these conditions, usually with a closed system of business between companies.

  This situation was far from an adequate solution for this type of waste management, as OECD countries were solving it, particularly the member states of the European Union. Since 2002, the member countries of the European Union had a policy that combined environmental and social concerns, where electrical and electronic waste was included. This means that Latin American laws, including the Chilean one, have been nurtured on the European integrated system for waste created 14 years earlier.

  Two years after the European provisions, in 2004, the Regional Latin American and Caribbean Platform for Electronic Waste (RELAC) proposed to work on the digital gap, which, according to their diagnosis, contributed to increase the lag in waste management in the region. To this end, it was proposed to investigate and raise awareness about the link between Information and Communication Technologies (ICTS) and electronic waste.

  In this line, the RELAC Platform has contributed to giving urgency and visibility to this problem in public and private spaces of the region. In parallel it has also worked in finding solutions in Chile, a country where its headquarters is located and from where regularly participates with the Ministry of Environment.

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  Electronic Waste Management

  • G H Eduljee, R M Harrison, G H Eduljee, R M Harrison(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Royal Society of Chemistry

    (Publisher)

  Broader acceptance and implementation of sector-wide quality standards is needed to inspire consumer confidence and differentiate high-quality reuse operations from grey sector reuse. This could involve a further implementation of PAS-141 type standards. This barrier is especially relevant for high-tech equipment such as computers. Collection and logistical difficulties Current methods of bulky waste collections are oriented towards quick, cost-effective collection and disposal or recycling. This can result in items being damaged in transit, rendering them no longer suitable for reuse, even if in good condition at the time of collection. Storage of WEEE delivered to HWRCs often leads to damage, for example by the weather. A large proportion of small WEEE are disposed of as residual waste owing to their perceived lack of value. Lack of ecodesign of products and difficulty with dismantling Smaller products and limited ecodesign considerations mean repair or dismantling for components can be difficult. This is especially the case for smartphones and tablets, but applies to other products too, such as microwave ovens and washing machines (see below). Perceived lack of standardised warranty and guarantee offers for reused products Offering a warranty and technical support for reused products can help allay consumer concerns about purchasing reused equipment. Although many reuse organisations offer short term (3–6 month) guarantees for items and will replace them, consumers perceive a lack of reliability in reused products, especially small WEEE. Lack of repair options and replacement parts Spare parts for items are often not available, or available at a discouragingly high price, resulting in the purchase of a new product rather than the repair of an old one, whether the item is in warranty or not. Repair and parts are often restricted to dealers authorised by the brand, and labour costs often exceed the cost of the product. Resistance from producers and lack of consumer awareness Producers have tended to discourage direct support for second-hand sales for fear of devaluing the brand and its image, and concerns over warrantees and guarantees. Greater awareness of environmental impacts of WEEE disposal could encourage consumers to reuse.

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