Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-04-19-Speech-1-169"
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"en.20040419.13.1-169"2
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".
Madam President, I have distributed a list to the secretariat indicating which amendments are acceptable to the Commission. I will limit myself to commenting on two issues that have been raised during the debate and explain once more why the Commission did not propose a ban.
As you know, the Commission carried out an extended impact assessment in preparing this proposal. It has assessed the sustainability of different policy options, including a substance ban. It is important to recall that in this proposal the Commission has maintained a general restriction on the use of mercury in batteries, in line with the existing Battery Directive. The restrictions in the End-of-Life Vehicles Directive also continue to apply, so the provisions are there.
However, on the basis of this impact assessment, a substance ban for other batteries was not chosen for the following reasons: a substance ban can only be considered if viable substitutes exist. At the moment, these substitutes do not exist for all applications. A ban would always be limited in scope and would never be able to cover all hazardous batteries. As we have already heard, a substance ban might not cover cordless power tools, emergency lighting and industrial applications. In fact, a ban would only represent around 16% of the total nickel cadmium battery market and less than 6% of the total lead battery market.
A large percentage of these hazardous batteries are currently in use or stored at home. It is estimated that 60% of rechargeable portable batteries are 'hoarded' or stored at home. They would not be covered by the ban and would still risk ending up in the environment. For cadmium batteries, the substitutes have a shorter lifespan and are more expensive, so that would create more waste and extra costs for consumers. These are the main arguments as to why we chose a closed-loop solution.
We have proposed this closed-loop system for all batteries. That should ensure that batteries no longer end up in the waste stream but are collected and recycled instead. For industrial NiCad batteries the closed-loop system is guaranteed by the proposed ban on landfill and incineration.
Those are our main arguments. I suppose that this will be debated from now on, but we all seem to agree that it is important to monitor what is going on and find the best solution to make sure that these hazardous substances and batteries do not end up in the waste stream. They must be taken care of.
I thank you for your work on this report and for the debate."@en1
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