Suchergebnisse

The focus of the environmental policy-making has shifted noticeably during the last decade. From having played a fairly insignificant role in the 1980s and earlier, product-related environmental problems have attracted an ever-increasing interest from policy-makers, especially in industrialised countries in North-Western Europe. Considerable attention has been devoted to the concept of extended producer responsibility (EPR) and today this concept is spread to most OECD countries and also outside this group of countries. This dissertation shows how the concept was developed, presents a model for various types of responsibilities and defines the EPR concept as a policy principle for environmental improvements of products and product systems. Experiences from existing EPR systems are studied and complemented with an analysis of proposed system implementations. The results are combined with a model for how an EPR system can be developed in order to give the incentives for change to the relevant actors. Conclusions concerning how the details of EPR systems should be organised are presented, as well as a discussion about the advantages and disadvantages with involving various actors in the policy development process and the role of these actors in the implementation of the system.

There has been an upsurge of interest in the principle of extended producer responsibility (EPR) among policy makers and scholars in non-OECD countries. The principle has been applied and its impacts studied rather extensively in various OECD countries. However, similar experiences are largely lacking in non-OECD countries. This paper presents some ongoing research and preliminary findings on the management of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE). The research aims to explore both potentials and limitations of EPR under non-OECD conditions. Hitherto, there have been four projects in three countries: India, Thailand, and Argentina. The first project in India in 2007 investigated the specificity of this non-OECD context and the explanatory boundary of the principle. The second phase of the research studies a WEEE policy development in the three countries. At the time of writing, they appear to follow different courses of action. The India Government issued a guideline suggesting an incorporation of WEEE under the existing Hazardous Waste Rules. The Thai Government shows particular interest in economic instruments, such as product fees and deposit-refund system, and has been working on a draft law that would govern the use of these instruments for the management of some WEEE and other used products. In Argentina, a senator proposed a dedicated WEEE framework law based on EPR. Our analysis identifies collection of post-consumer WEEE as a major practical bottleneck particularly when there is a strong presence of the so-called informal sector. EPR can be a driving force for improvements by mobilising resources from producers and channelling them to end-of-life management. In addition, in a long run, it can lead to design changes in products and product systems. However, market anomalies in a non-OECD context such as sizeable black/grey markets for several product groups and/or illegal import of used products can put identifiable legal producers at a disadvantageous position and retard feedback mechanisms in an EPR programme. Thus, the applicability of policy alternatives should be assessed against the conditions of particular contexts. We also discuss the importance of problem definition in policy processes.

The scope of the compendium covers many parts of theemerging circular economy. We choose to place considerablefocus on some of the substances that we extract from theground – in particular raw materials and critical materials.We focus on circularity in these areas, because presentlywe use too much, too fast, and we are not re-using nearlyenough. In turn, this approach demands that we look atthe technologies that rely on such materials, and howbusinesses are innovating to make circularity of materialsa reality.This document provides many concrete examples of whatwe mean by sustainable materials management. We presentcutting edge insights on a range of topics.• Why raw material supply chains are important to society?• How circularity can benefit us?• Where changes in our economies are required?• Who needs to be involved?• What businesses are doing to make the circular economya reality?• How governments and regulators can support the circulareconomy?