Europe approves new bill for collecting old batteries to curb pollution

The European Parliament on Wednesday gave preliminary
approval to a new program for collecting and recycling
batteries to limit pollution; the plan is expected to cost
industry at least €200 million.

Representatives of the European Parliament, EU governments
and the European Commission agreed late Tuesday on rules
that have been under discussion since they were first
suggested in 2003, the European Parliament said in a
statement.

Programs to protect nature from the often toxic substances
contained in batteries are to be enacted in all 25 EU
countries by 2008.

The legislation, which affects companies like Energizer
Holdings and Philips Electronics, "will help consumers to
consume more intelligently and producers to reduce
pollution," Dagmar Roth-Behrendt, a German member of the
Parliament, said Wednesday in Brussels.

The new legislation will require 19 of the EU's 25 members
to set up programs for collecting spent consumer
batteries. Austria, Belgium, Germany, France, the
Netherlands and Sweden already have such systems in place.

The law will also ban some portable cadmium batteries and
prohibit the dumping in landfills or burning of automotive
and industrial batteries, most of which are already
collected. The EU wants to ensure that all such batteries,
which make up about 86 percent of the market, are
collected.

By 2012, a quarter of all batteries sold must be collected
once they run out. By 2016, the target will rise to 45
percent.

Distributors will be required to take used batteries back
at no charge. The rules also determine how batteries must
be recycled once collected.

Battery producers and distributors will foot most of the
bill for implementing the recycling programs and educating
the public about where to turn batteries in. The European
Commission calculates that the recycling and education
programs cost at between €200 million and €400 million.
-from Bloomberg News, The Associated Press