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If you get it wrong in even 10 percent of the cases, the effect will be enormous” |
Ed Sperling (Electronic News) has a great article about how the RoHS procrastinators are slowing the process down for the rest of us.
There’s some good news in all of this. Vendors say the level of awareness of the approaching deadline for the European Union’s Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) -- and its international counterparts in China and a handful of states within the United States -- is finally reaching an acceptable level.
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Handheld RoHS Screening units |
Dr. Ron Lasky's article on the use of handheld XRF "guns" in screening for banned RoHS substances acknowledges that the units have limitations.The guns can't differentiate between Hex-Chrome and Trivalent-Chrome, and they are only testing a sample lot; not precise measurements:
...these devices have limitations, can produce false positives when testing materials for banned substances, and can't discern critical differences between similar substances like Cr VI vs Cr III and brominated flame retardants.
Their real value is in providing quick incoming component inspection.
Unless you are absolutely sure of the quality, labeling and origin of your lead free components, you should be doing statistical incoming component inspection for at least the next year. The chance of receiving counterfeit, mislabeled or non-compliant parts is extremely high, especially from lesser known overseas origins.
Remember, while the current specification is, effectively, the "honor system", the EU docks will be checking for RoHS compliance. Better to eat the costs of statistical incoming inspection for a year than risk your EU revenue and market share if you are found non-compliant.
However, the handheld units are pricey for such short term use (about $44,000 USD). Outsourcing the inspection for the short term makes financial sense.
If you would like a quote on statistical incoming inspection service, please contact us. |
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Originally, RoHS ("Restriction of Hazardous Substances") was the term applied only to EU RoHS. It is now a generic term for any country's environmental safety directive having to do (primarily) with reductions in six common hazardous materials routinely found in electronic information products.
EU RoHS
The original EU Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive (EU RoHS) 2002/95/EC became European Law in February 2003. This directive restricts the use of six hazardous materials in the manufacture of various types of electronic and electrical equipment.
It is closely linked with the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive 2002/96/EC (WEEE) which sets collection, recycling and recovery targets for electrical goods and is part of a legislative initiative to solve the problem of huge amounts of toxic e-waste.
The deadline for EU RoHS compliance was July 1, 2006
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The Business Impact of RoHS |
RoHS compliance is underway
 EU RoHS (Reduction of Hazardous Substances) required all manufactures selling electronic products into the EU to remove hazardous materials including: lead, cadmium, mercury hexavalent chromium, polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) and polybrominated biphenyl ethers (PDBE) from their products.
This directive is aimed at reducing the amount of hazardous waste and increasing recycling efforts for electronic products.
The Business Impact
This could be business as usual or a business nightmare.
Even if Europe isn't a key market for you, China RoHS begins in March 2007. Failure to comply could mean your products are stuck at the loading dock in Europe or China. Any of these markets represent a significant amount of revenue loss.
The countdown in underway, are you ready?
Read about the Cost of Compliance...
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