The European Union restricts the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment in the RoHS Directive 2011/65/EU. However, Eu RoHS contains exemptions from the general as listed in Annexes III and IV of the RoHS Directive.
Significantly, such lists are constantly evolving as technology advances. You can read about some of the past updated RoHS exemption lists in this article.
In 2021, the EU put nine exemptions under review for an expiry date extension.
Since then, other exemption amendments apply. Here are the current updated lists of EU RoHS exemptions.
The Öko-Institut launched an investigation to gather data regarding the above exemptions and released its report on January 13th, 2022. As of late the Öko-Institut has only published recommendations, but Enviropass recommends that manufacturers and suppliers monitor these exemptions for updates.
Recently, the European Commission issued RoHS amendments to update the list of exemptions. They added or extended the expiry dates of a few exemptions in Annexes III and IV effective as of March 25th, 2020.
| Exemption | Amendment | Description | Update(s) |
9, 9(a)I, 9(a)-II Annex III | Directive (EU) 2020/361 | In absorption refrigerators, hexavalent chromium (Cr) as an anticorrosion agent can be present up to 0.75 percent by weight of the carbon steel cooling system | Exemption 9 from 2011/65/EU split into 9, 9(a)I, 9(a)-II The expiry dates are according to different categories |
41 Annex III | Directive (EU) 2020/365 | For solders and termination finishes used in some hand-held combustion engines containing lead (Pb). | Exemption renewed The expiry dates are now according to different categories |
37 Annex IV | Directive (EU) 2020/360 | For lead (Pb) in platinized platinum electrodes used for specific conductivity data. | Exemption renewed Change in expiry dates |
41 Annex IV | Directive (EU) 2020/366 | For lead (Pb) utilized as a thermal stabilizer in polyvinyl chloride, which is employed in various in-vitro diagnostic medical devices that analyze blood and other bodily fluids and gases. | Exemption renewed Change in expiry dates |
| 44 Annex IV | Directive (EU) 2020/364 | For certain radiation-tolerant video camera tubes containing cadmium (Cd). | New exemption |
The amendment states that, this exemption applies to “hexavalent chromium as an anticorrosion agent of the carbon steel cooling system in absorption refrigerators up to 0,75 % by weight in the cooling solution”.
The categories in question are categories 8, 9, and 11.
As for when this exemption will expire, for categories 8 and 9 that don’t fall into in-vitro diagnostic medical devices or industrial monitoring and control instruments, the expiry is July 21st, 2021.
For category 8 in-vitro diagnostic medical devices, the expiry is July 21st, 2023.
Lastly, for category 9 industrial monitoring and control instruments and category 11, the expiry is July 21st, 2024.
The amendment states that this exemption allows “up to 0,75 % hexavalent chromium by weight, used as an anticorrosion agent in the cooling solution of carbon steel cooling systems of absorption refrigerators (including minibars) designed to operate fully or partly with electrical heater, having an average utilized power input < 75 W at constant running conditions”.
The categories in question are categories 1 through 7 as well as 10.
As for the expiry, March 5, 2021, marks the end for all categories.
The stated entry allows “Up to 0,75 % hexavalent chromium by weight, used as an anticorrosion agent in the cooling solution of carbon steel cooling systems of absorption refrigerators” and that for refrigerators “designed to operate fully or partly with electrical heater, having an average utilized power input ≥ 75 W at constant running conditions” and for refrigerators “designed to fully operate with non-electrical heater”.
The categories in question are categories 1 through 7 as well as 10.
Furthermore, July 21st, 2021, marks the expiry for all categories.
The amendment renewed the original exemption 41 of Annex III and changed the expiry dates as follows:
The amendment renewed the original exemption 37 of Annex IV and extended the expiry date to December 31st, 2025.
The amendment renewed the original exemption 41 of Annex IV and extended the expiry date to March 31st, 2022.
As the amendment states, exemption 44 applies to “Cadmium in radiation-tolerant video camera tubes designed for cameras with a center resolution greater than 450 TV lines used in environments with ionizing radiation exposure exceeding 100 Gy/hour and a total dose exceeding 100kGy”.
This applies to category 9 electronics and expires on March 31st, 2027.
The European Commission updated the list of EU RoHS exemptions in March 2017 and created four new exemptions, with expiry dates: 9b-I, 13b-I, 13b-II, and 13b-III. Moreover, they added exemptions 9b, 13a, and 13b.
La liste des exemptions de RoHS Europe a été mise à jour en mars 2017 par la Commission européenne. 4 nouvelles exemptions avec des dates d’expiration ont été créées : 9b-I, 13b-I, 13b-II et 13b-III. De plus, des dates d’expirations ont été ajoutées aux exemptions 9b, 13a et 13b.
Enviropass maintains the updated list.
La liste à jour est maintenue par Enviropass.
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