Waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE): appropriate measures for permitted facilities

The appropriate measures for waste treatment at regulated facilities with an environmental permit for the treatment of WEEE.

1. You should give priority to preparing WEEE so it can be reused either as a whole or in part. If it cannot be reused, you must make sure it is recycled or recovered at a suitable permitted or exempt WEEE treatment facility.

2. You should identify and segregate all WEEE that could be reused as soon as possible to prevent damage to it and to maximise the opportunities for reuse.

3. You must store WEEE designated for reuse under weatherproof covering and separate from other WEEE. You must transport it securely to an appropriately permitted or exempt site for preparing for reuse.

4. WEEE that is POPs waste must not be prepared for reuse – follow the guidance on how to identify and destroy waste that contains POPs.

5. You must demonstrate that any WEEE that is being prepared for reuse is fully functional and electrically safe. You should treat WEEE (both whole appliances and recovered parts) that is being prepared for reuse under a suitable standard such as BS EN 50614:2020.

6. If you are preparing WEEE for reuse you must take precautions to make sure there is no pollution of the environment. The standards specified elsewhere in this guidance for storage of components, liquids and other materials apply equally when WEEE is being prepared for reuse.

7. If you are removing or re-charging refrigerants that are F-gas in temperature exchange equipment you must be suitably qualified to work with F-gas.

1. Where WEEE cannot be prepared for reuse it must be treated to maximise the recycling and recovery of materials whether that is at the same facility or by further downstream processing.

2. You must fully understand, monitor and optimise your waste treatment process to make sure you treat waste effectively and efficiently. You must not treat waste to deliberately dilute it or mix any hazardous outputs with any non-hazardous outputs.

3. The treated output material must meet your expectations and you must fully classify and characterise them to ensure they are suitable for their intended disposal or recovery route.

4. You must identify and characterise emissions from the process and take appropriate measures to control them at source.

5. You must have up-to-date written details of your treatment activities, and the abatement and control equipment you are using. This should include information about the characteristics of the waste you will treat, and the waste treatment processes, including:

6. You must have up to date written details of the measures you will take during abnormal operating conditions to make sure you continue to comply with permit conditions. Abnormal operating conditions may include:

7. You should use material flow analysis for relevant contaminants in the waste to help identify their flow and fate. You should use the analysis to determine the appropriate treatment for the waste either directly at the site or at any subsequent treatment site.

8. Material flow analysis considers the contaminant quantity in the:

9. You should use the analysis and your knowledge of the fate of the contaminants to make sure you correctly treat and either destroy or remove them.

10. The use of material flow analysis is risk-based considering:

11. A treatment process may destroy certain substances in the waste. It could also put substances into the air, water or the ground, or produce residues which are sent for disposal. You should minimise the weight of these outputs. The treatment process may produce residues for recovery or reuse and you should maximise the weight of these outputs.

12. You must not proceed with the treatment if your risk assessment or material flow analysis indicates that losses from a process will cause:

13. To track and control the process of change, you must have a written procedure for proposing, considering and approving changes to technical developments, or to procedural or quality changes.

14. You must minimise the release of diffuse emissions to air from activities which may give rise to them (for example, shredding or granulating) by:

15. Unless you are preparing it for reuse, you must remove all fluids from WEEE along with those substances, mixtures and components listed in Annex VII of the WEEE Directive.

16. Removal may be a staged process and may be undertaken at different facilities. You must be able to demonstrate either:

17. You must make sure that any substances, mixtures and components removed as part of your treatment process are subsequently recovered or disposed of at an appropriately permitted facility.

18. If you transfer partially treated WEEE to another site you must properly describe it, so the recipient knows which treatments are complete and which still need to be done.

19. You should no longer routinely find certain hazardous items and substances that were once used in electrical appliances but are now banned. However, they may still be present on occasions. For example, any capacitors found in equipment manufactured before 1987 should be assumed to contain polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) unless there is clear evidence to the contrary. Asbestos may be found in old coffee pots and heating elements. You must be alert to these possibilities and ensure you have documented procedures in place to identify and remove them for appropriate disposal before any mechanical or shredding operation takes place.

Capacitors containing PCB are POPs waste and must be treated in a way that results in the destruction of the PCB content.

20. You must monitor and record the outputs of your treatment activity, including their weight. The monitoring must be used to provide evidence that the treatment and removal of these components and substances has been carried out to a satisfactory standard.

21. When removing components, you must safely remove the whole item where breaking it up might:

22. Components that you must always remove whole, that is intact and identifiable, (unless this guidance states specific circumstances where you do not need to) include:

23. Instead of removing them as whole components, you may recover the following as fragments or materials using mechanical treatment:

24. You may either:

25. You must pack and store lithium and lithium-ion batteries removed from WEEE during treatment in a way to minimise the likelihood of electrical shorting, physical impact and overheating.

26. All outdoor WEEE treatment areas must have an impermeable surface with a sealed drainage system. It must collect all surface water run-off and channel it to a blind sump unless it may be lawfully discharged.

27. Indoor WEEE treatment areas must have an impermeable surface and you must provide spillage collection facilities appropriate to the materials being handled.

28. WEEE treatment should take place under weatherproof covering such as a roofed building. Where this is not practicable, for example, due to the large size of the plant, appropriate measures must be taken to minimise the exposure of waste to rain and wind. This may include the covering of:

1. You must identify, separate and remove any plastic containing BFRs for further treatment.

2. Some BFRs used in electrical appliances are POPs. An industry-led investigation identified the presence of decabromodiphenyl ether (deca BDE) and other polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE) in some WEEE plastics.

3. You must make sure that any items of WEEE and any component or material fractions derived from the treatment of WEEE that is POPs waste (as defined by Regulation (EU) 2019/1021 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on persistent organic pollutants) are treated as required by that regulation. This means the treatment must make sure the POP content is destroyed or irreversibly transformed. The only known cost effective way of doing this is by incineration or similar thermal treatment. You must not recycle this plastic.

Check the guidance on the classification of WEEE and the presence of POPs.

4. POPs may be present in any WEEE category. In large domestic appliance (LDA) white goods (tumble driers, washing machines, dishwashers and cookers only) and temperature exchange equipment, POPs have been shown to be present but in insufficient quantities to make the appliances themselves POPs waste.

5. All other categories of WEEE should be regarded as POPs waste, unless you have clear evidence of the chemical composition of the cables, printed circuit boards and plastic components in the individual devices present that demonstrates it is not.

6. Plastic removed from WEEE that is POPs waste must be managed as POPs waste.

7. Components that have been found to contain POPs above the POPs waste threshold include printed circuit boards and electrical cable. If you remove these and/or any other components that may be POPs waste as a separate stream from any type of WEEE you must treat them and any plastic fractions resulting from their treatment, as POPs waste unless you have clear evidence that proves they are not.

8. The treatment of WEEE that is not POPs waste, but which may contain POPs in some components, may result in fractions where the POPs threshold is exceeded. You must assess plastic containing fractions at each stage in the treatment process to establish whether the threshold is exceeded and, where it is, manage those fractions as POPs waste.

9. You may treat any plastic that is POPs waste to separate the POPs containing fraction from the non-POPs containing plastic. For example, density separation can be used to separate plastic containing all BFRs from that which does not. The non-BFR plastic may then be recycled. You must demonstrate that your process reliably achieves a satisfactory separation.

10. Other hazardous chemicals may be used as flame retardants. For example, antimony trioxide has been widely used as a synergist with a range of BFRs, not just those that are POPs. It has also been widely used in polyvinyl chloride (PVC) cable even where BFRs are absent. It is present in some plastics at concentrations exceeding the hazardous waste threshold. You must consider antimony trioxide when you are classifying any WEEE or plastic containing fraction from the treatment of WEEE.

11. You must not repair or refurbish for reuse any WEEE that is a POPs waste – it must be treated to destroy the POP.

12. Deca BDE was the last of the PBDEs to be banned from use in electrical equipment under the Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive (RoHS) and came into effect during 2008. Even so, there is evidence that deca BDE is present in some appliances manufactured since then.

13. If you prepare for reuse WEEE that may be POPs waste, you can only do so if it has an original manufacture date on or after 1 January 2009 and if it is reused within the UK.

14. If you repair or refurbish WEEE that may be POPs waste and intend to export the equipment for reuse abroad, you must demonstrate that the equipment does not contain POPs.

1. At least once a year, for every WEEE stream you treat, you must carry out a mass balance exercise to determine and record the mass of each individual output fraction derived from a given mass of input material. The batch size must be large enough to make sure you can assess a representative sample of typical input materials.

2. You should compare each set of results with previous results to monitor the performance of your site and to ensure it is performing optimally.

3. Where process monitoring requires chemical analysis to be carried out on waste fractions and residues produced by your treatment process, this must be carried out by an independent accredited laboratory, using recognised accredited methods where they are available.

4. You must have, and be able to provide, a full description of the material testing and analysis procedures and methods used, which provide details of the calibration methods and reference standards used.

5. You must choose the sample containers and packaging used for storing and transporting according to the nature and requirements of the materials they will contain. For example, chemical properties, pressure and gas tightness.

6. You must clearly label sample containers with at least the name of the treatment facility, a description of the waste material or residue contained, the waste stream it was produced from and the date of sampling.

7. You must make sure that any required sample is representative of the waste and has been taken by someone technically competent to do so. A representative sample is one that takes account of the full variation and any partitioning of the material.

8. Samples must be stored in a dark, cool place and dispatched to the laboratory for analysis as soon as possible, preferably within 24 hours of being taken.

9. You must carry out sampling under normal operating conditions unless otherwise stated.

10. If process monitoring shows that the performance of your treatment plant does not meet any of the standards stated in this guidance, you must send a report to the Environment Agency, summarising:

11. Wherever possible you should sample waste fractions and residues in line with relevant guidance, for example:

1. The main environmental risk from the treatment of gas discharge lamps is the release of mercury. Mercury may be present as a vapour but will also be present in the phosphor powders, glass, electrodes and end caps.

You must remove mercury from any gas discharge lamps where it is present including fluorescent tubes, compact fluorescent lamps, high intensity discharge lamps, high pressure sodium lamps and cold cathode fluorescent lamps.

2. You must not manually break lamps that may contain mercury.

3. You can only crush lamps to reduce volume before transport using dedicated crushing equipment designed and built specifically for that purpose.

4. You must make sure you capture and contain mercury vapours, dusts and powders when you treat lamps – including if you crush for volume reduction when particular care must be taken during the changeover of bags receiving crushed material. Suitable extraction and abatement must be provided for the receipt and handling of crushed but otherwise untreated lamps.

5. Whether you are crushing for volume reduction or carrying out full treatment, you must make sure all equipment is sealed and operated under negative pressure. You must channel and abate all exhaust gases through a filter system that captures dust and mercury. This will require the use of both a HEPA (high efficiency particulate air) filter and a sulphur-impregnated carbon filter.

6. You must regularly check, maintain and replace as necessary all parts of your treatment plant and any associated equipment including seals and filters to make sure they remain fit for purpose. You must retain evidence of maintenance procedures and the replacement of parts for at least 2 years.

7. You must immediately clean up spillages of broken or crushed lamp material using appropriate equipment, such as an industrial vacuum cleaner with suitable filters, to retain mercury vapour and dust. Used filters and all spill materials that cannot be recycled must be stored in gas-tight, leakproof containers, labelled as mercury containing waste and disposed of at an appropriate authorised site.

8. Your recycling process must keep phosphor powders separate from recycled materials to minimise contamination by mercury. You must store removed phosphor powders in gas-tight sealed containers. You must store other processed materials securely.

9. The phosphor powders should be treated to recover rare earth elements where that technology is available and is economically viable.

10. You must treat lamps containing metallic sodium so that no metallic sodium remains.

11. Certain specialist lamps may pose additional hazards. For example, xenon lamps used in cinema applications may contain thorium 232 and are also highly pressurised. Quantities of radioactive material are very small and below the threshold that would require a radioactive substances permit. Small quantities of these lamps can be recycled with other lamps but you may need to take additional precautions when handling them.

12. Plastic containing components from lamps may contain flame retardants. You must manage these as containing BFRs including POPs unless you can demonstrate they are absent.

The following monitoring requirements and limits apply to the specified fractions derived from lamp recycling.

13. Recycled materials including glass, plastic and metal fractions must be sampled and tested for mercury at least once every 6 months. The limit value is 10mg/kg total mercury for glass, plastic and 100mg/kg for metal.

14. Phosphor powders must be sampled and tested for mercury at least once every 6 months with a limit value of 200mg/kg total mercury. Further treatment should be used to reduce mercury concentrations to below this value where necessary.

1. Hazardous substances present in cathode ray tubes include high concentrations of lead oxide in the neck glass (about 40%), funnel glass (about 20%) and solder glass or frit (about 75%). The phosphor powders coating the screens contain compounds of transition or rare earth elements, often zinc or yttrium. The plastic casings as well as other plastic components such as cables and printed circuit boards may contain BFRs that are POPs.

When you treat CRT equipment you must remove the following items and materials:

2. The plastic casings of CRT TVs and monitors are known to often contain high concentrations of BFRs including POPs. Other components such as cables and printed circuit boards may contain them too. You must manage CRT equipment and all separated plastic from CRT equipment as POPs waste unless you can prove it is not.

3. You must take steps to minimise the uncontrolled breakage of CRTs, especially when the deflection coil is being removed.

4. You must separate panel glass (low lead content) from the neck, funnel and frit glass that contains much higher lead concentrations. The cleaned panel glass may be suitable for use as an aggregate in certain applications.

5. You must take measures to minimise the release of activated coatings, particularly when the CRT is broken to remove the electron gun.

6. You must split the screen from the funnel and then remove the activated coatings – this is usually done by suction.

7. All activities involving the breaking or splitting of CRTs as well as the removal of the activated coatings must take place in a controlled environment that minimises the release of any dust. For example, within a booth provided with local exhaust ventilation and suitable abatement.

8. You must only mechanically process equipment containing CRTs if you can achieve effective separation of the panel glass from all of the activated coatings so they are removed as a separate fraction.

9. Mechanical processing of CRT equipment or the crushing of CRT glass must be provided with an adequate dust extraction and abatement system to make sure dust release is minimised.

10. Where your process produces a crushed panel glass fraction for recycling, you must sample and test it at least once every 6 months for:

1. Many flat panel displays (FPDs) use cold-cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFLs) as back-lights which contain mercury. Unless you can clearly identify a display as having a plasma screen or a screen backlit by LED or organic LED (OLED), you must treat all FPDs as though they contain CCFLs. The plastic casings as well as plastic components such as cables and printed circuit boards may contain BFRs that are POPs.

2. When you treat FPDs you must remove the following items and materials:

3. If manually removing CCFLs, you must remove them very carefully to minimise breakage and the release of mercury. You must only remove them within a controlled environment such as a sealed booth with local exhaust ventilation.

4. If mechanically removing CCFLs, you must do this in a way that avoids any contamination of other fractions with mercury. You must only remove them within a controlled environment such as a sealed booth with local exhaust ventilation.

5. You can only shred whole or partially dismantled FPDs containing CCFLs if you can clearly demonstrate that:

This must include determining the total mercury concentration in all output fractions and residues from the process.

6. Whether using mechanical or manual processes to remove CCFLs, you must use appropriate air extraction, abatement and filter systems to capture dust and mercury vapour. This will require using both a HEPA filter and a carbon filter.

7. Once removed, CCFLs must be treated following the guidance on treating gas discharge lamps in section 5.5. Where that treatment does not follow on immediately, you must pack CCFLs to prevent breakage following the guidance on storage of gas discharge lamps in section 4.2.

8. You must remove broken lamps from the working areas. You must collect any residues from broken lamps using an industrial vacuum cleaner with suitable filters to retain mercury vapour and dust. You must store all broken lamp debris in appropriate gas-tight, leakproof containers, until they can be treated in line with the guidance on gas discharge lamps.

9. The plastic casings of FPD televisions and monitors, as well as the cables and printed circuit boards, are known to often contain high concentrations of BFRs including POPs. You must manage FPD equipment and all separated plastic from FPD equipment as POPs waste unless you can prove they are not.

10. Where you use a mechanical process to remove CCFLs from FPD equipment, or you use a shredding process to shred equipment containing CCFLs, you must carry out the following monitoring:

1. Small mixed waste electrical and electronic equipment (SMW) can consist of many different categories of WEEE, including those requiring specific forms of treatment such as CRT equipment, gas discharge lamps and temperature exchange equipment containing refrigerants. You must identify items such as these and remove them for appropriate treatment.

2. If you treat separately any particular categories of small WEEE, the guidance in this section still applies subject to any category specific guidance that may exist, for example for display equipment.

3. Some appliances found in SMW are known to contain high concentrations of POPs in plastic components such as casings, cables and printed circuit boards. You must manage SMW and all plastic containing fractions from treating SMW as POPs waste unless you can prove they are not.

4. You must remove the following items from SMW before mechanical treatment:

5. You must remove the following items from SMW before mechanical treatment unless your specific process makes sure they remain whole and intact, and you have effective procedures to remove them following that treatment:

6. You must also remove the following from SMW, but you can do this as material streams after mechanical treatment:

7. If you mechanically treat SMW, you must provide and use an effective dust extraction and abatement system to minimise dust release.

8. Where you use a mechanical process to shred SMW you must sample the physically finest non-metallic fraction at least once every 6 months and test for:

1. This can consist of many different categories of WEEE including those requiring specific forms of treatment such as flat panel display equipment. You must identify items like these and remove them for appropriate treatment.

2. Some appliances found in IT, telecommunications and business equipment are known to contain high concentrations of POPs. You must manage this waste stream and all plastic containing fractions arising from the treatment of it as POPs waste, unless you can prove they are not.

3. If you mechanically treat IT, telecommunications and business equipment, you must meet the standards for small mixed WEEE (see section 5.8).

4. Where you use a mechanical process to shred IT, telecommunications and business equipment, you must sample the physically finest non-metallic fraction at least once every 6 months and test for:

1. LDA that may be treated in conventional metal shredders is limited to only:

2. You must have effective procedures in place to ensure that other types of WEEE are removed from mixed loads of LDA before it is treated by shredding, especially:

3. You must remove the following items when treating LDA, but you can do this as material streams after mechanical treatment, provided any capacitors remain whole and intact:

1. Photovoltaic panels may contain hazardous substances such as lead (in solder), cadmium telluride and compounds of selenium (in the semiconductor layer of non-silicon based photovoltaic panels).

You must establish, maintain and use an effective process for identifying non-silicon based photovoltaic panels.

2. You must remove the lead from all photovoltaic panels and you must remove the hazardous semi-conductor layer from non-silicon based photovoltaic panels.

3. Where you shred non-silicon based photovoltaic panels, you must sample and test the recycled glass fraction at least once every 6 months for cadmium with a limit value of 10mg/kg cadmium.

1. You may use a range of separation technologies to further segregate and purify shredded fractions of WEEE. For example, eddy-current separators, electrostatic separators, and density separation, either at the shredding facility or elsewhere.

2. You must fully characterise and classify fractions produced by these processes.

3. Where materials originate from WEEE that was POPs waste, fractions of plastic containing brominated flame retardants must be managed as POPs waste.

4. Where materials originate from WEEE that was not POPs waste, fractions of plastic containing brominated flame retardants must be assessed to determine if they are POPs waste.

5. You must fully characterise and classify (including for POPs) process solutions and washings from density separation processes before determining suitable disposal options. Where these originate from the treatment of POPs waste, any POPs must be destroyed.

6. You must only use waste codes for single material outputs, for example plastic, where the treatment involved is aimed at producing a pure material fraction. Contamination by other materials must be negligible.

7. You must monitor at least once every 3 months how much BFR containing plastic is present in any fraction destined for recycling.

1. You must record in the waste tracking system:

what the treatment residues, treated components and fractions are