WEEE Ireland

Recycle IT are delight to share some recent news! WEEE Ireland had a great year in 2016 with some 34,482 tonnes of waste electrical equipment recycled. Some of the most interesring facts in the WEEE Ireland’s 2016 Annual Report are revealed below

• There has been a increase of 12% in the recycling rates in just one year.
• Irish consumers recycled 34,482 tonnes of waste electrical equipment in 2016 with WEEE Ireland – the equivalent of approximately 15 million household appliances or
• Irish consumers recycled almost 10kg of waste electrical and electrical equipment per person.
• 49% of this waste was large household appliances; 15% fridge / freezers and 12% was television sets.
• 24% was IT equipment, monitors, lamps, luminaries, consumer equipment and electrical tools
• 15 million units of WEEE were diverted from landfill; 11.5 million units of which were mixed small appliances
• 812 tonnes of waste portable batteries were collected by WEEE Ireland for recycling, equaling approximately 32,000,000 waste batteries
• Ireland reached and surpassed its EU battery recycling target of 45% by the end of 2016
• 80% of the raw materials recovered from large household appliances are reused and recycled.

Annual Report

These achievements were outlined by WEEE Ireland, on June 22nd 2017 when the team presented its annual report.  The report shows that WEEE Ireland has gone above and beyond the targets set out by the EU which will soon increase to 65% takeback of all WEEE placed on the market. This new target represents a high priority for WEEE Ireland that must be achieved by 2019 in order to maintain Ireland’s exemplary status in WEEE recycling.

The report revealed that Irish people love to work hard and play hard (responsibly) with takeback of both electrical tools and electrical toys growing by 140% and 122% respectively. Refrigeration appliances were another high performing category, with Irish consumers leaving 103,000 fridge freezers in the safe and capable hands of WEEE Ireland. Large household appliances remain a consistently high performing category, representing 49% of all WEEE collected in 2016

These impressive takeback rates mean WEEE Ireland was able to donate €50,000 to their long-standing charity partner, LauraLynn, Ireland’s Children’s Hospice, with whom they recently announced a further 5 year commitment to until 2022. This brings the total amount of charitable donations made to LauraLynn since the beginning of the partnership in 2011 to €285,000.

About WEEE Ireland

WEEE Ireland coordinates collections of electronic waste via three core channels; Retailers, Civic Amenity Sites and Collection Events. 54% of the tonnage of electrical waste collected by WEEE Ireland in 2016 came via its strong network of retailers, 30% from Civic Amenity Sites and 16% of WEEEE collected was from WEEE Ireland collection events. Batteries can be recycled in the familiar Blue Battery boxes, located in many Retailers across Ireland. For a full list of these, visit the WEEEE Ireland website.

WEEE Ireland works on behalf of its member producers to help them meet and comply with the legal obligations imposed by the WEEE Directive 2006/66/EC. Apple Distribution, Dell, Panasonic, Philips, Whirlpool, Glen Dimplex and IBM Ireland are just some of these 912 members who collectively placed 56,000 tonnes of electrical and electronic equipment on the Irish market last year.

About Recycle IT

Recycle IT is an award-winning not for profit social enterprise providing a collection and drop off service for all types of waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE). During 2016 Recycle IT offered drop off and collection services to 100,000 homes and businesses across Dublin and surrounding areas collecting a range of WEEE which includes thousands of computers, cables, monitors, microwaves and TV’s.

Recycle IT services are provided in partnership with WEEE Ireland. Recycle IT are supported by Pobal, South Dublin County Council and authorized by the National Waste Collection Permit Office and the local authorities across Dublin, Kildare and Wicklow.