The final report of Öko-Institut e.V. and Fraunhofer IZM on the adaptation to scientifc and technical progress under the RoHS Directive has been published on the website of the European Commission today (http://ec.europa.eu/environment/waste/weee/pdf/final_reportl_rohs1_en.pdf).

 

 

The Final Report on the adaptation to scientific and technical progress under the RoHS Directive has been handed to the European Commission (DG ENV) today. It is currently under evaluation. For further information please contact the EU Commission directly.

A third stakeholder consultation on the review of the Annex to Directive 2002/95/EC (RoHS) concerning exemption request 5 "Lead in solders for the connection of very thin (<100 µm) enamelled copper wires and for the connection of enamelled clad aluminium wires (CCAWs) with a copper layer smaller than 20 µm" starts today, 13 August 2008. This consultation will run for eight weeks until 8 October 2008. For further information, please visit the section Consultation 3.

 

The second stakeholder consultation on the review of the Annex to Directive 2002/95/EC (RoHS) concerning exemption request 4 "Cadmium for use in solid-state illumination & display systems" starts today, 29 May 2008. This consultation will run for nine weeks until 31 July 2008. For further information, please visit the section Consultation 2.

Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM have to cancel the technical stakeholder meeting on exemption 9(a) "DecaBDE in polymeric applications" which was originally scheduled for 13 June from 9:00 - 12:30. This is due to the fact that the European Court of Justice (ECJ) has on 1 April 2008 issued a judgement which rules that from 30 June 2008 onwards DecaBDE shall be banned in all applications falling under the scope of RoHS. The European Commission has accepted the ECJ ruling meaning that the exemption will be deleted from the Annex. A discussion on technical and scientific pros and cons of a possible exemption is thus not necessary.

Since this case had not been foreseen at the beginning of the contract on the evaluation of RoHS exemptions, the Commission first needs to decide on how to proceed with the information collected during the online stakeholder consultation in the light of these recent events.

Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM apologise for any inconvenience caused and kindly ask stakeholders to wait until a decision has been taken on the further procedure.

An addition to the contribution on behalf of AeA Europe, EECA, ESIA, EICTA and JCBE on RoHS Exemption 6 has been posted (Exemption 6).

All non-confidential documents provided during the consultation are now
online.

Technical stakeholder meetings in Brussels will probably be held with regard
to exemptions nos. 1-4, 5, 6, 7(a)-7(c), 8, 9a, 13, 16-20, 25 and 26. Relevant
stakeholders will be invited via e-mail since the number of participants is
limited. Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM are currently planning to hold
these meetings in week 24 (9 - 13 June). The aim is to discuss these 9 exemptions within 5 days. The detailed agenda will be anounced as soon as possible.

Concerning further exchange with regard to the other exemptions and/or
exemption requests, Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM will contact
stakeholders directly in order to fix bilateral meetings or clarify open
questions via telephone and e-mail.

The online consultation regarding the possible amendment of the Annex of the
RoHS Directive is closed.

The stakeholder contributions will be posted on the website as soon as possible. Due to the large amount of contributions this may take a few days.

As a next step, Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM will evaluate the results of the consultation. The stakeholder who submitted comments will all have the possibility to amend, discuss and adapt their contributions if necessary. Öko-Institut and Fraunhofer IZM will either directly discuss and clarify open questions with individual stakeholders or will invite stakeholders to meetings on more complex issues.

New information has been uploaded on the RoHS exemptions consultation website with regard to exemptions 5, 7, 14, 15, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27 and 28. For the sake of clarity and transparancy we have added additional excerpts from our 2007 final report as well as from corresponding monthly reports to the individual exemptions sections. For exemption 20 we have also added an excerpt from our 2006 final report.

Please also take these results of previous evaluations into account when drafting your contribution.

The stakeholder consultation starts today, 28 January 2008, and will run for nine weeks until 1 April 2008. The consultation covers the 29 current exemptions to the RoHS Directive as well as three new exemption requests. For further information, please visit the section Consultation.

This project website gives an overview on activities related to the adaptation of the RoHS Directive’s Annex. In the Background section you will find information on related legislation, previous assessments and reports as well as a comprehensive project description.

The Consultation section will host the foreseen stakeholder consultation(s) during the project duration. The first stakeholder consultation covering the 29 current exemptions to the RoHS Directive as well as three new exemption requests will be launched early January 2008 and will run for 8 weeks.

Stakeholders can register under Registration and state their subjects of interest in order to regularly receive information on project progress as well as questions in the course of the evaluation.