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Keeping the faith
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23/02/2006
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With the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) Directive due to be enforced on 1 July 2006, there is a flurry of compliance activity. Whilst some companies are well ahead with preparations, others are still at the investigative stage. And with clarification on some important exemptions only recently received, it is hardly surprising that many companies aren’t as far ahead as they would like.
Consider the problems faced by distributors; not only do they have to assess the compliance of thousands of products, they also need to maintain stock of compliant and non compliant parts – the latter for exempt products and for repairs.
Preparation for the introduction of new legislation like RoHS on this scale isn’t achieved overnight. One of the largest hurdles for RS Components was RoHS’ seemingly variable timeline. Graham Johnson, UK marketing manager, says: “It appeared somewhat of a moving feast and there was the risk that RoHS would be ‘rolled’, along with WEEE legislation.”
In the early days, there was much confusion. Recounts Johnson: “RoHS is about finished goods, so as a component distributor, we thought it wouldn’t impact components. However, it quickly became apparent that you need compliant components to build compliant equipment, so the number of products under investigation snowballed. Currently, there are about 250,000 components that we have outstanding or completed RoHS actions on.”
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Author
Graham Pitcher
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