The electrical goods manufacturers' compliance scheme has said it plans to meet with government in the next couple of weeks to discuss financing options for recycling WEEE, particularly for equipment placed on the market before August 2005.
The government is currently drawing up legislation to implement the European WEEE Directive later this year. The Directive requires producers of electrical goods to be financially responsible for the recycling and treatment of equipment put on the market after August 2005.
However, REPIC is concerned over the funding for recycling WEEE placed on the market before this date and has advocated a “separate environmental handling fee” charged to consumers when they purchase new products.
Uwe Hanneck, CEO of BSH Home Appliances and chairman of the REPIC board, said: “It's the most sensible way to cover the cost of a 40 year span of product made before the directive comes into effect.”
He added: “We've got product over 20 years old entering the waste stream now, and we'll still be dealing in 20 years' time with product made this year.”
Not all manufacturers support the visible fee approach, and some strong objections have been voiced particularly from producers in the IT sector such as Hewlett Packard (see letsrecycle.com story).
REPIC currently represents 36 major electronic manufacturers including Whirlpool, Sony, Hitachi,Toshiba and Sharp and it estimates this is the equivalent to 70% of the major appliance, small appliance and consumer electronics markets.
The chief executive officer of REPIC is expected to be announced in the next couple of weeks as the compliance scheme begins operations.
Mr Hanneck said: “REPIC is a very fast moving organisation. We agreed to form our company last November, registered it in December, held our first general and board meetings in March and will open for business in two weeks' time. REPIC is by far the largest compliance scheme – and it's special because it's run for producers by producers.”
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