RoHS - the EU's Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive - has had a profound impact on the whole electronics industry through 2006, and next year is likely to prove just as traumatic.
Why's that? Because China is about to enact its own version of the lead-free rules. My colleague Suzanne Deffree at Electronic News in the US has written this excellent article, Supply chain braces for China RoHS in 2007, which we have reproduced on Electronics Weekly.
While the six banned substances (lead, mercury, hexavalent chromium, cadmium, polybrominated biphenyl and polybrominated diphenyl) remain the same, it looks like China RoHS is being implemented in a completely different way to the EU legislation.
“China is taking a radically different approach than did the EU. The EU had a date and time and said all products are covered by this except the ones that are out of the scope, like military. In China, they will publish a catalogue that will say what will be covered the first year. Right now, you don’t know if you are going to be covered yet,” said Steve Schultz, director of strategic planning and communications for Avnet Logistics.
The warning is: just becuase you comply with EU RoHS, don't assume compliance with China RoHS. March 1 should be very exciting!
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