EU readies new battery mandates

The European Union is poised to enact some of the world’s toughest environmental standards for batteries in less than two weeks.

Manufacturers have had nearly two years to prepare for the changes that ban some chemicals and change labeling requirements. But instead of redirecting their attention on other markets, manufacturers are preparing for the inevitable: that markets around the globe are soon to follow with requirements that could be a boon to clean energy storage technologies.

"Europe is too large a market to shy away from, so everybody has adjusted accordingly," said Dan Squiller, CEO of San Diego-based rechargeable battery maker PowerGenix. "Also I think there’s a general belief that what's happening in Europe is going to expand to other geographies."

The mandates starting Sept. 26 impose restrictions on the labeling, recycling and composition of all batteries sold in the EU, regardless of origin, except for those used in military and space applications.

The legislation:

• prohibits the sale of batteries with a weight of 0.0005 percent mercury or 0.002 percent cadmium.
• requires labeling of batteries that contain mercury, cadmium or lead.
• bans the sale of appliances with built-in batteries that can’t be replaced.
• requires labeling on batteries to boost recycling rates from about 3 percent now to 25 percent in 2012 and 45 percent in 2016.

Countries including Brazil and Argentina have already drafted legislation similar to that of the EU, said George Kerchner, executive director of the Portable Rechargeable Battery Association, a nonprofit trade group.

“A lot of countries considering these restrictions don’t have the infrastructure the EU does to oversee and enforce the collection and recycling program, so they’re watching to see how the EU does it,” Kerchner said.

About 160,000 metric tons of consumer batteries are sold in Europe every year. In 2002, approximately 45 percent went into landfills or incinerators.

One of the most difficult changes for battery sellers will be the requirement that an increasing amount of the batteries are recycled, Kerchner said.

All manufacturers that sell to the EU market will be responsible for the cost of the collection-and-recycling program.

A few countries, including Ireland, have said those targets will be hard to meet, so the EU has offered extensions to implement the rules.

The U.K. has said it will delay that portion of the EU’s legislation until late spring or early fall of 2009. The UK currently recycles about 2 percent of batteries, but other countries already have recycling programs in place that meet the 2016 requirements. Belgium, for example, recycles about 60 percent of its batteries, according to the EU.

There are a few exemptions. Button batteries can contain up to 2 percent mercury, and the cadmium limit can be exceeded in emergency lighting, alarm systems, medical equipment and cordless power tools. Nickel cadmium batteries, or NiCds, are the predominant power source for the field, but companies such as PowerGenix are developing rechargeable batteries for power tools that contain no cadmium.

The EU plans to revisit the rules for power tools in a few years, and Squiller said he thinks the EU will enact stricter rules, or outright ban, NiCds as member countries Denmark and Sweden already have.

The price of NiCds is poised to skyrocket in a few months, Squiller said. In China, where a majority of NiCds are produced, a 13 percent rebate on the export of nickel cadmium batteries will expire Jan. 1.

"This will raise the price of NiCds by a significant amount, and manufacturers will try to absorb some of cost increase, but it's too much to absorb 100 percent," he said. "You'll see a significant increase in cost of nickel cadmium batteries."

China adopted the rules in part because of environmental concerns and worker safety, but also because of the potential harm of NiCds in the country's landfills.

Also to divert harmful waste from landfills, California is looking at legislation that would echo the EU's ban on certain elements in electronic devices and on electronics with batteries that can't be replaced. This year, AB 218 got stuck in the Senate Appropriations Committee, but other legislation in the works could impose similar restrictions.

"We're looking at the EU and how they're dealing with electronics," said Andrew Zingale, a legislative staffer for Assemblywoman Lori Saldana, who authored AB 218 with input from electronics makers and environmental groups. "The manufacturers’ feedback was they want consistency in the market instead of one set of rules in Europe, and one set in California, and another elsewhere in America."

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