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WEEE: The European Union (EU) Directive on Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment. The Directive deals with the collection, treatment, recovery and recycling of electrical and electronic waste products. The WEEE Directive's aim is to transfer the responsibility for disposal of up to 6 million tons of potentially hazardous WEEE produced within the EU annually to producers of these products. Producers will be required to recycle equipment at end of life instead of disposal to land-fills. This is also referred to as “producer responsibility”. Companies selling electric or electronic devices in the EU will be required to mark new products with a durable marking or label to indicate separate collection of the device at the end of its useful life, and also be prepared to take back and recycle these products. Failure to comply with WEEE legislation will result in fines. The Directive was supposed to take effect 13th August, 2005, however, Germany's requirements take effect in March, 2006 and the UK has indicated that its regulations may take effect in January, 2006. Holland, Belgium and Sweden should be on time as they already operate national WEEE recycling schemes.

The categories of electrical and electronic equipment covered by the directive include large and small household appliances, IT and telecommunications equipment, consumer equipment such as television sets, lighting equipment, tools, toys, leisure and sports equipment, medical devices, monitoring and control instrumentation, and automatic dispensers such as vending and ATM machines.

Read the full text of EU Directive 2002/96/EC on waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE).

* An Amendment to Article 9 of the original WEEE Directive was published in August, 2005.  Read the Amendment ot Aritcle 9.