EC Agrees on Battery Recycling Proposal

The European Commission’s Commissioner for the Environment, Stavros Dimas, welcomed the conciliation agreement on the new Battery Directive reached this week. The new Directive aims to ensure the collection and recycling of all batteries in the European Union at the end of their useful life and to prevent their incineration and disposal. The agreement includes the possibility to exempt small producers from the obligations to finance the waste management of batteries, a requirement that batteries need to be removable from appliances so they can be recycled as well as a requirement that the battery capacity needs to be indicated on the label for consumer information purposes.

Commissioner Dimas said: "The EU gives high priority to making sure that batteries and accumulators no longer cause health and environmental problems due to the heavy metals they contain. Now it is time to start implementing the provisions of the new Battery Directive. The faster we start to collect and recycle batteries, the better for the environment”

The new Directive will set minimum collection targets of 25 percent and 45 percent of the average annual sales over the past three years, to be achieved respectively four and eight years after the transposition of the Directive.

The new Directive will also require collected batteries to be recycled. In the conciliation agreement, the European Parliament and the Council agreed on a recycling target of 50% for all batteries not containing cadmium or lead, which the European Parliament initially wanted to increase to 55 percent.

For cadmium and lead containing batteries there are also specific recycling targets, established at 75 percent and 65 percent, respectively.

Finally the new Directive will make producers financially responsible for the waste management of batteries. The European Parliament and the Council agreed upon a de minimis rule, giving Member States the possibility to exempt small producers from their financial responsibilities.

Once adopted the new Battery Directive will replace the existing Battery Directive

The agreement reached in the conciliation committee needs to be formally adopted by the Parliament and Council, after which the new Directive can be published in the Official Journal. Member States will have to transpose it into national law within two years of its adoption. Until then, the existing Battery Directive continues to apply.

Approximately 800,000 metric tons of automotive batteries, 190,000 metric tons of industrial batteries and 160,000 metric tons of portable (consumer) batteries are placed on the EU market annually. The metals used in those batteries vary considerably and include mercury, lead and cadmium (batteries containing them are considered hazardous waste by Commission Decision 2000/532/EC), nickel, copper, zinc, manganese and lithium.