Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE)

WEEE is the fastest growing waste stream in the UK, growing by at least 5% each year.

We dispose of over 1.2 million tonnes of electrical and electronic waste every year in the UK from the public alone.

Each and every year, this is the equivalent of:

150,000 double decker buses
or
164 Eiffel Towers
or 
200,000 African Elephants
or
444,444 Range Rovers

The amount of electrical waste created by members of the public in the UK would fill the new Wembley 6 times over every year!

The average UK citizen will discard of 3.3 tonnes of WEEE in a life time – equal to one double decker bus for each and every family.

Two million TV sets are discarded alone every year.

Electronic waste is increasing three times faster than average municipal waste and the EU estimates that WEEE currently accounts for 4% of total waste.

Much of the UK’s electronic waste ends up in landfill sites, where toxins put communities at risk. Failure to segregate any type of recyclable material in the home will usually result in items being disposed of in a landfill site (buried in the ground in the UK) or being incinerated.

It has been estimated that landfill space in the UK will run out within the next 10 years. Recycling WEEE will have significant effects on the environment.

Where WEEE is not recycled, this waste can have negative impacts on soil, air and water quality which can lead to environmental damage, and which can also lead to negative impacts on human health and animal heath.

Find out how to minimise your effect on the environment by visiting www.recycle-more.co.uk

• Locate your nearest recycling facilities for electronic waste with the recycle-more bank locator, which includes an easy to use interactive mapping system.
• You will also find advice and tips on how to recycle waste electrical goods and other household items, making it quick and easy for everyone to recycle-more!

Compliance with the UK Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Regulations

In order to partially meet our obligations as a distributor as defined in the UK Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) Regulations (SI 2006 No. 3289 - 11 December 2006) (referred to hereafter as "the WEEE Regulations"), we have opted to become a full member of the Distributor Take back Scheme (DTS). Membership of the DTS is defined in regulation 35 of the WEEE Regulations and delivers exemption from the requirements of regulation 31 (to "ensure that WEEE from private households can be returned to him free of charge and on a one-to-one basis") and regulation 34(1) (maintenance of records).

As a member of the DTS, we have made a financial contribution toward the development of the network of Designated Collection Facilities (DCFs) instead of offering instore take back of WEEE. This financial contribution is described in paragraphs 83 to 88 of the UK WEEE guidance, and has been used to improve the WEEE collection facilities located at Local Authority Civic Amenity sites.

In addition, through our support of the national recycling website, recycle-more.co.uk, we will also meet our obligations under regulation 33 to make information available to users of EEE in private households on :

a) the requirement on each Member State under Article 2 of the Directive to minimise the disposal of WEEE as unsorted municipal waste and to achieve a high level of collection of WEEE for treatment, recovery and environmentally sound disposal;

b) the collection and take back systems available to them;

c) their role in contributing to the reuse, recycling and other forms of recovery of WEEE under these Regulations;

d) the potential effects on the environment and human health as a result of the presence of hazardous substances in EEE; and

e) the meaning of the crossed out wheeled bin symbol.