Environmental footprint and material efficiency support for product policy : report on benefits and impacts/costs of options for different potential material efficiency requirements for electronic displays

The main objective of this report is to provide scientific support for the development of measures to improve the extraction of key components from electronic displays, and discusses about their benefits and environmental impact. The analysis focus on two types of components: printed circuit boards (PCBs) and thin film transistors (TFT). The report analyses several possible thresholds for a combined time for their extraction. The report proposes that the time to extract PCBs larger than 10 cm2, TFT panels and film conductors in electronic displays smaller than 25 inches (63.5 cm) shall not exceed 260 seconds, whereas for electronic displays equal or larger than 25 inches (63.5 cm) shall not exceed 480 seconds. The implementation of the proposed requirement would allow the recovery of about 7-14% of copper, 17-33% of silver, 14-28%, of gold, 15-29% of palladium and 16-32% of indium contained in LCD TVs sold in the EU in 2012. The potential economic benefit of recovering such amount of metals is estimated to be 58 to 144 million Euros.