Post a CommentCompany Calls for U.S. Version of RoHS
By Colleen Taylor -- Electronic News, 9/19/2006
On the heels of the European Union's Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive, which took effect July 1, Newark InOne is calling for a comparable law to be enacted in the United States.
Although no national RoHS-style legislation has been proposed yet in the United States, California has enacted its own RoHS rule, SB20/SB50, which takes effect January 1. The state's rule is not as comprehensive as the EU's RoHS. It addresses only four of the six substances that the European Union RoHS rule addresses (cadmium, lead, mercury and hexavalent chromium) and applies only to a select group of products sold through California retailers (laptops, CRTs and TVs with screens greater than 4 inches in size), noted Newark InOne, a subsidiary of distributor Premier Farnell plc and a distributor of RoHS compliant electronic components, information and services in the Americas.
That rule’s scope, the company believes, is set to be expanded. In addition, state rules aimed at restricting mercury have been enacted in California, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.While it’s difficult to argue that setting regulations on tech companies to make manufacturing more environmentally friendly is a bad thing, the gradual, state-by-state legislation that is currently the trend in the United States is dangerous to American businesses in many ways, according to Newark InOne.
"Increasing and varying state-by-state rules are already causing unnecessary complexity for electronic manufacturers and distributors who must try to track and meet them all," Paul Tallentire, Newark InOne's president, said in a statement. "Are we going to wait until we have 50 state laws with 50 flavors, before we enact a uniform national standard for our industry?"
Along with the difficulty that companies can expect to encounter when working toward compliance for RoHS-like laws, global competition is another concern stemming from the United States' current state-by-state method. Other countries, such as China and South Korea, have proposed RoHS-style regulations, setting the stakes higher for the United States to remain competitive, Tallentire argued.
Meanwhile, there is evidence that the United States is moving toward setting a national e-waste standard. Congress recently had the Government Accountability Office (GAO) conduct hearings and study the e-waste problem, Newark InOne noted, acknowledging the burden that "patchwork" state requirements were placing on manufacturers, retailers and recyclers. The GAO's report recommended that a national WEEE-style rule be written, the company said.
