OT-ish - RoHS Compliance

Tournifreak · 2006-04-20T10:46:29+00:00

Dear all - I work in the electronics industry and we are having toremove cadmium and various other fairly nasty materials from ourproducts. Which I guess is fair enough. But we're also removing leadfrom tin-lead solder. The reason that has been given for this is toprevent environmental damage when the product is eventually disposedof.The thing I don't understand is - and I've been on training for thissubject and no-one has been able to answer the question - is whydoesn't it affect building materials?I reckon my house has at least 2 square meters of lead on the roof.(It's a complex design) Rainwater runs off this all the time and thenseeps into the ground and into lakes and rivers.I still have a quantity of lead water pipes in my house (as do many,many people).So is there really any good reason for removing lead from electroniccomponents and PCBs when there's all this lead being sued in thebuilding industry? Or is it just another piece of do-gooderthumb-twidling buraucratic EU nonsense? (With big fines)Interested if anyone knows the answer... Jon.

Apr 20, 2006 21 Replies

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Ian_m 20 years ago

Because is only illegal and a prosecutable offence after July 2006. You can do what you like, sell what you like until then.

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Steven Briggs 20 years ago

In message , Andy Hall writes

Absolutely. It'll be a bit like when the EMC directive was introduced, what, 10 years ago. Supposedly enforced by trading standards, but they have neither the skills or the funding. In the early days a couple of TSOs scrapped together funds to drum up a couple of prosecutions (PC assemblers and the famous hair-dryer importer), then, AFAIK, little has happened since. I'm know there's stacks of stuff from this county on the market that hasn't got EMC certification, never mind the shed loads of s**te that gets imported from China.

I better go and take my medication now.

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