REACH, RoHs, WEEE & Batteries Legislation: An Overview
If you or your company export to Europe, you need to understand these European laws. Even if you’re not the manufacturer and are only re-selling someone else’s products.
In this edition, we’ll talk about why these European laws exist. We’ve found it helps non-Europeans to better understand the rationale behind these laws. Future blogs will address each of these laws in more detail.
Why All These Crazy Laws?
Europe has a serious landfill problem. It’s a growing problem in the U.S. and other countries as well, but the population density in Europe makes the problem much worse there than in the U.S.
Population density is higher, making land more expensive. For example, the average population density in the U.S. is about 32 people per square kilometer, compared with Austria, which is more than 3 times as dense at 102 people/square kilometer. Land is even more scarce in other European countries, with the Netherlands coming in at about 403, and the small island nation of Malta at nearly 1300 people per square km.
Not surprisingly, landfill disposal costs are also much higher. Not only is land for landfills scarcer and land prices higher, the need for landfills is greater because there are so many more people generating waste.
According to the Waste Business Journal, the average cost in the U.S. is $43/ton, but rising fast. Compare that with Austria, where disposal costs are more than 2 times higher at about $107/ton.
What to Do?
The current EU waste disposal laws all began with Germany’s experiment in trying to reduce the amount of packaging waste created. They created the now-legendary “Green Dot” (or Grüne Punkt) system, which contained a novel idea: the producer of the packaging would pay for the packaging 
waste created, giving manufacturers and distributors a huge incentive to come up with creative ways to reduce that waste. A special green dot placed on packaging showed that the producer had pre-paid for the disposal costs.
The program was popular, and spread across Europe. Then the concept spread to other kinds of wastes. Central to each law was the idea that the producer of the waste should pay for its disposal. This is a fundamentally different approach than in the U.S., where the consumer or end-used of the waste pays to dispose of it. American companies sometimes have a hard time understanding the EU waste laws, and it may be helpful to remember this key difference when trying to comply with these laws.
Are You a Producer?
If you export products to Europe, you’ll need to know the basics of the WEEE, Batteries, RoHs, and REACH directives, and determine if or how they affect your products and your European customers. The status of products imported into Europe can be complicated, and may vary from country to country in Europe.
You may be considered a producer, and not yet know it — enforcement so far has really focused on European-based producers. But that will change over time. And even if you’re not considered the producer, the disposal or treatment costs at the product’s end of life may affect your customer, the pricing of your products, and your product’s competitiveness in Europe.
If you export animals, food, feedstuffs, or unprocessed raw materials, you can stop reading. Everyone else, read on….
In the next installment, we’ll talk about the WEEE (waste electrical equipment) and batteries laws in more detail.
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