February
7, 2007
Do
We Need a U.S. RoHS Law?
Europe
has a RoHS directive. Japan has controlled the substances in the components that
go into their electronic products for many years. China is the newest country
to enact rules – which begin to go into effect March 1 – governing the chemical
content of electronic products. The United States, however, is the only major
economic region that has shunned major legislation banning hazardous materials
in electronic components.
But
that hasn’t stopped U.S. states from enacting laws. A California law went into
effect on January 1, 2007. California regulation, The Electronic Waste
Recycling Act, bans components that contain the hazardous substances included
in the European Union’s RoHS directive. Other U.S. states are also moving to
enact RoHS-like legislation. Minnesota, Maine, New Jersey, Tennessee, Vermont,
Washington and Wisconsin are all taking a look at RoHS-like laws.
We
may end up with a patchwork of state laws that make it difficult for
manufacturers to comply across the U.S. market. “If you’re a domestic
manufacturer, a mix of state laws will increase the cost to manufacture
products,” says Paul Tallentire, president of Newark InOne, a Chicago-based
components distributor. “California bans one set of substances, while another
state may go stricter with mercury and force the manufacturer to pass higher
thresholds.”
One
solution to the problem of a U.S. mish-mash of laws would be a federal law that
supercedes state laws and give manufacturers one target regulation to comply
with. There is some concern in the industry that a federal law would not be
helpful unless it did override state laws. Yet many states resist the federal
government’s moves to supercede the laws they have enacted. “The federal law
would have to supercede that state laws,” says Tallentire. He notes that there
is wide industry support for congress to enact a federal law. “We did an
informal survey on our website, and the industry support for a federal RoHS was
overwhelming.”
There
is one faction in the electronics industry that disagrees with the concept of a
federal RoHS on principle. This group claims that the science behind RoHS is
flawed and that any further legislation just furthers a bad idea. Tallentire
sees RoHS laws as inevitable and thus the industry should support the least
obtrusive version, which would be a consolidated federal regulation. “My
response to those who oppose a federal law is ‘Get a life,’” says Tallentire.
“It’s going to happen. Allow it to happen. If you’re manufacturing products in
North America, the vast majority of your export markets now require RoHS
compliance. It’s a reality now.”
Tallentire
notes that much of the U.S. manufacturing base has still not moved to comply
with RoHS laws. “Our survey in October showed the U.S. market is 50 percent
ready for RoHS,” says Tallentire. “There are different degrees of preparation,
and most manufacturers are preparing to comply with the European RoHS, but a
good percentage is actually trying to avoid the impact of RoHS.”
He
also notes that the industries that are exempt from RoHS may have some
difficulties in the near future. The exempt industries are those that require
high-reliability parts. They include defense, medial device manufacturers, some
portions of aerospace, and some portions of telecommunications. Many of these
companies took the position that RoHS would not affect their operations. The problem
is, many of these companies have been purchasing consumer off-the-shelf (COTS)
components for years. And now, those COTS components are going lead-free.
With
COTS going lead-free, the exempt industries have to choose between shifting to
lead-free components – which might fail under the stress some defense products
have to withstand – or shift to higher-priced leaded versions of the COTS
products. Since component manufacturers have switched their high-volume
production to lead-free, the portion of their leaded runs (if they haven’t
discontinued them altogether) will cost more.
“The
exempt product will continue to be made, but the prices have increased
significantly,” says Tallentire. “Some have almost doubled.” He also notes that
many of the exempt manufacturers have started to seek products from secondary
distributors. “Those in the exempt industries are going to find it harder and
harder to find parts,” says Tallentire. “They’ll have to manage their supply
chain very carefully.”
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