In New York, E-Waste Recycling Law Takes Effect

Environmental advocates and New York City officials say that manufacturers have gotten off to a slow start educating the public and posting information on their Web sites about how consumers should proceed.

The new law mandates that manufacturers pay for the collection, handling and recycling of electronic products to keep materials that may contain toxic metals like lead and mercury from going into the trash, and later into incinerators and landfills. While some major companies already take items back through collections and trade-in programs, the new law requires the makers of electronics to set up a permanent system of collections throughout the state.

Part of the goal is to make it simpler for consumers to prepare for 2015, when it will be illegal to throw electronics into the regular trash.

New York City officials had been hoping that companies would supply the state with detailed information on pickups or drop-off sites before the law’s effective date so the city could help promote the services on its Web site, through direct mailings and through its 311 help line. Few were forthcoming, the officials said.

To link the public with collection outlets, “people have to have a simple place to go for information,” said Robert Lange, director of the Sanitation Department’s Bureau of Waste Prevention, Reuse and Recycling.

Kate Sinding, a senior lawyer with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said the needs of consumers in the state varied widely depending on where they lived. “Most of these sites make it appear that the only way to return stuff is by going to a drop-off location,” Ms. Sinding said.  “While that might be a viable option in many parts of the state, in others like New York City and rural areas, it will be more difficult.” Manufacturers in such areas will need to start providing and advertising collection events, she said.

Companies are relying on different methods to take back the products, including mail and collection posts at storefronts and in government and residential buildings, said officials with the State Department of Environmental Conservation, which will oversee the enforcement of the law.

So far, 69 manufacturers have registered their collection plans with the Environmental Conservation Department, which has posted a list of the companies’ Web sites online and invited consumers to submit feedback on compliance by the manufacturers. The department said it had no estimate on how many companies covered by law had failed to respond.

The companies must collect recyclables at levels commensurate with their shares of the market for a combined yearly minimum. The department predicts that minimum will approach 100 million pounds by the third year of the program, said Michael Bopp, a spokesman.

Some companies have joined together to pool resources. MRM, a collective of 26 major companies, including Eastman Kodak, Panasonic and Sharp, plans collections at Salvation Army centers and periodic drop-off events with local partners like the Lower East Side Ecology Center in the city and others.

David Thompson, the president of MRM, said it had so far arranged for about 260 drop-off sites, 55 of them in the city, that would take any brand.

Roughly two dozen states have passed similar electronic waste laws. Unlike some of them, local sanitation departments in New York State generally do not offer curbside collection programs for e-waste, Mr. Thompson noted.

In New York City, one problem has been that manufacturers balk at paying for pickups from apartment buildings, said Mr. Lange of the Sanitation Department. He said that it would take at least a year to assess the new law and which collection sites were the most convenient, but that he remained optimistic.

“It will be successful for one reason: people really don’t want to throw out computers,” Mr. Lange said. “There’s a visceral reaction that computers have some residual value, and some people will take a cab for 15 blocks to drop off a computer.”