More effective RoHS enforcement on the way

More effective RoHS enforcement on the way
London, UK — The governments of EU countries are working together to better enforce the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) regulations in Europe that ban hazardous substances from electrical and other household and commercial products, according to Intertek Group plc, a quality and safety services company. As part of its service offering, Intertek provides services to governments and companies to help monitor and test for RoHS.

At an international forum held last month in Washington DC, authorities responsible for RoHS in EU countries announced their plans to begin working together informally, with more structured co-operation agreements to be progressed at the next EU enforcement network meeting in the Netherlands next month (November 2008).

Since RoHS laws came into effect in July 2006, governments have been criticized for a lack of effective monitoring to enforce compliance with the laws, which has resulted in some companies continuing to sell products with hazardous substances over allowable limits.

"Though the ban came into force in the summer of 2006 there was a transitory arrangement that meant all existing equipment already put onto the EU market, though still in stock, could still be sold legally," said Torben Norlem, Esq., Health & Environment Chief Counsel at Intertek. "So the EU enforcement authorities during the first year had a low profile because most of the equipment on the market was exempted from the ban. They would have to wait at least one year to ensure that all old product was swept from the market. It wasn't until the summer of 2007 that it made sense to start enforcing the ban on the EU RoHS," he said.

The first coordinated RoHS enforcement activities took place in Nordic countries during the fall of 2007 and from that point on enforcement activities have started to pick up speed in the EU.

The results of the initial enforcement by different authorities throughout the EU show that a significant part of the industry has not been able to get fully compliant, said Norlem. "If you have a non-compliant rate of up to 20%, which was not uncommon for the different enforcement campaigns, it clearly shows there is a need for further investment and compliance activity."

As a result, government bodies across Europe now plan to improve the effectiveness of their RoHS monitoring and resources dedicated to it by adopting a cross-border model, following successful efforts by Nordic countries. New cross-border RoHS monitoring collaborations are likely to see more reporting on the outcome of their activities annually.

Reporting of non-compliances further disincentives companies from breaching laws, by increasing the damage to their brand, consequent loss of sales, goodwill and market share from the negative exposure, according to Intertek.

In 2007, the Nordic countries united their RoHS program and increased the depth of monitoring and reporting of non-compliances by sharing data cross-border, which has resulted in more effective enforcement. The Nordic countries' approach was to divide the industries and products covered by RoHS between them so that each focused on a dedicated industry in more depth and then share that data.

This allows the agencies to divide up their resources as cost effectively as possible so they can cover as much ground as possible without checking the same products, Norlem said. "Many suppliers sell products in multiple European countries. If the EU enforcement authorities share more data between them, they can better identify non-compliant products across all countries and utilize their available resources collectively," he said.

At the present time, there is no centralized mechanism for tracking RoHS non-compliance, but Norlem doesn't believe it's necessary to make the system work. "It would be a good track keeper over a longer period of time but at the present stage there is no such centralized mechanism for RoHS. Nevertheless, the system already shows the efficiency by dividing the resources and using it in a targeted way, and everybody gets results which are put in the public domain. It would be nice to have a centralized database but I don't think it's necessary to make this system work."

"EU governments are also looking at more international collaboration with local-RoHS monitoring authorities in China and the United States. Many products sold in Europe are that of companies trading worldwide, so there is scope for more collaboration internationally," said Norlem.

"There is RoHS-like legislation popping up in a lot of places in the world including Korea, Japan, China and different states in the U.S., which have specific bans on some of the substances so it's a global trend," added Norlem.