Advocates claim bill gutted - Electronics Recycling

Recycling Today, Oct, 2003

Some organizations have expressed disappointment that Senate Bill 20, passed by the California Legislature and signed by Gov. Gray Davis, does not require more effort from electronics manufacturers.

The Computer Take Back Campaign, a coalition of local, state and national organizations promoting producer responsibility as a means of increasing electronics recycling, says the bill is an unsuccessful compromise because it no longer prohibits export of potentially hazardous electronic scrap to developing countries.

SB 20, signed into law by Davis Sept. 25, establishes a recycling fee of between $6 and $10 on the sale of new televisions and computer monitors that contain cathode ray tubes (CRTs) to help fund the recycling or management of these discarded devices. A provision also allows the California Integrated Waste Management Board to increase those fees should they fail to cover the cost of recycling.

Despite efforts to enact a bill that would require manufacturers to take back obsolete items for domestic reuse or recycling, California has instead "created a recycling system that will be government run and insufficiently funded", the Computer Take Back Campaign claims in a release.

"The bill also fails to ban the continued export of e-waste to developing countries that do not have the infrastructure to protect people from exposure to hazardous substances in e-waste," Robin Schneider, Texas Campaign for the Environment, says. "Instead, the bill sets up a series of restrictions that do not go far enough to solve the problem."

However, similar to European directives, SB 20 retains language pertaining to the phase out of some hazardous chemicals in products over time.

"The producer responsibility provisions of this measure include a 2007 ban on the use of some of the most toxic materials in electronic devices sold in California," Rico Mastrodonato of the California League of Conservation Voters, says. "Additionally, manufacturers will be required to report on efforts to reduce the use of toxic materials and design their devices for recycling."