From August 2018 the EU has decided that the 10 WEEE categories are to be replaced by 6 new categories and the scope will be expanded.
The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive, which was made an EU law in February 2003, was instituted to set collection, recycling and recovery targets for electrical goods, with the overall aim of recycling “at least 2% of electrical and electronics waste equipment by 2016”.
Over the years the directive has undergone a number of revisions. Until recently it had consisted of 10 categories, including large household appliances, lighting equipment, consumer equipment and medical devices. But this is now set to change, with the EU replacing them with 6 new categories:
- Temperature exchange equipment: fridges, freezers, air conditioning, etc.
- Screens, monitors, and equipment containing screens having a surface greater than 100cm²: TVs, computer monitors, etc.
- Lamps
- Large equipment (any external dimension more than 50cm): washing machines, dish washers, cooking stoge and hoven, cookers, luminaires, large printers, copying equipment, large equipment in general, etc.
- Small equipment (no external dimension more than 50cm): vacuum cleaners, calculators, video cameras, cameras, hifi equipment, watches and clocks, smoke detectors, payment systems, etc.
- Small IT and telecommunication equipment (no external dimension more than 50cm): mobile phones, tablets, routers, laptops, GPS, printers, etc
As a result of these new categories, according to WEEELogic, national compliance schemes “across Europe […] are currently working on a new structure that finally allows them to report back to their national Ministry the total EEE put on the market by producers as well as WEEE collected, treated etc. according to the 6 new categories. Therefore over the coming months we expect most national WEEE schemes to provide new price lists as well as new declaration categories and sub-categories for producers.”