De-Contamination of Small Waste Electrical and Electronic Appliances (sWEEE) in Austria

Minimum treatment requirements for Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) are laid down by the Directive 2002/96/EC (WEEE Directive, last amended by 2008/34/EC). Annex II (1) to the Directive specifies 15 substances, preparations and components in total, which as a minimum have to be removed from any separately collected WEEE (Depollution). The following components can be part of small Electrical and Electronic Equipment (sWEEE): capacitors (all PCB-containing capacitors and electrolyte capacitors), batteries, printed circuit boards, toner cartridges, liquid crystal displays, mercury containing components,
such as switches or backlighting lamps, asbestos-containing components, components containing refractory ceramic fibres, components containing radioactive substances, plastic-containing brominated flame retardants and external electric cables.

Treatment requirements for WEEE set in Directive 2002/96/EC include the removal of hazardous components (de-pollution). To date, no comparative analysis of achieved removal has been undertaken for small WEEE. In this paper, depollution in Austria is analysed. The mass of selected components (capacitors, printed circuit boards, batteries, toner cartridges and liquid crystal displays) removed is compared to estimated values for small WEEE input material. The results reveal that only a part of the components is actually removed with a high variation between components and plants assessed. The overall rate of removal ranged from 72% (estimated value for batteries) to 21% (estimated value for LCD-panels). This implies the forwarding of substantial quantities of hazardous substances to mechanical treatment processes particularly relevant in terms of dispersion of pollutants, health risks for plant workers and loss of valuable materials. However, the quantities of hazardous substances being introduced into incineration or MBT via small WEEE ending up as residual waste are even higher.



Copyright: © Lehrstuhl für Abfallverwertungstechnik und Abfallwirtschaft der Montanuniversität Leoben
Quelle: Depotech 2010 (November 2010)
Seiten: 6
Preis: € 3,00
Autor: Maria Tesar
Dr. Stefan Salhofer
 
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