Differentiated fees - a possible road to eco-friendly electronics

A Danish EPA environmental project about eco-design of electronic equipment suggests that environmentally balanced fees for waste treatment of electronics waste will motivate manufacturers to better incorporate resource management and recycling in their products as early as in the design phase.

The report points out that almost no European country, including Denmark, has succeeded in meeting the challenge of creating incentive to effectively incorporate the environment, resources and end-of-life in the design of electronic equipment when implementing the WEEE directive.

Poor environmental performance should cost more
The Danish EPA project Eco-design of electronic equipment proposes a new adapted model which takes the environmental performance of electronic equipment into consideration. In this model, the manufacturers of products with poor performance will have to pay more to be a part of a collective waste collection and treatment system. Whereas manufacturers of electric and electronic products with high environmental performance will pay less.

The model, which is inspired by a scheme that has been introduced in France, will be a further development of the existing Danish system for producer responsibility in which manufacturers as a practical main rule have to pay their share of the total costs solely on the basis of the relative weight of their production.

More detailed analysis under way
 The Danish EPA is working on a more detailed analysis of the proposed differentiated fees model. This includes an assessment of whether the proposal will provide the required incentive to produce more eco-friendly electronics. Furthermore, there will be a more accurate assessment of the administrative burden required to realise the proposal.

Deposit and tax systems are also possibilities
The environmental project lists an additional eight proposals to promote better exploitation of the potential in eco-design. These include the use of environmental taxes and a deposit system for small waste electronic equipment.

Download the project: Eco-design of electronic equipment
("Idea Catalogue" and "Summary and Conclusions" are in English. The rest of the report is in Danish.)

The proposals and recommendations of the project are based on research into the systems in place in countries both inside and outside the EU, as well as on discussions with a large number of players in the electronics value chain in Denmark and internationally.