Life-EPICS Project - Electronic Products - Impacts on Circular economy and Sustainable development

PROJECT DESCRIPTION

BACKGROUND

Electrical and electronic equipment is one of the fastest-growing waste streams in the EU, expanding by 2% annually, but with less than 40% being recycled. 

 

The traditional linear model of ‘take-make-use-dispose’ fails to encourage producers to make their products more circular — durable, reusable, repairable or recyclable. Many products break quickly, cannot be repaired, or are designed for single use, resulting in long-term environmental impacts, despite the fact that about two-thirds of Europeans express a desire to continue using their devices for longer, as long as performance is not compromised.

 

Value is also lost through wasted resources when partially or fully functional electronics are discarded because of factors such as irreparable components, non-replaceable batteries, unsupported software or unrecoverable materials. 

 

Citizens and consumers are seen as key drivers in the transition to a more circular and sustainable economy. Empowering consumers by providing them with more transparent information and cost-saving opportunities forms a core part of the EU's sustainable product policy framework. This includes details on product lifespan, the availability of repair services, spare parts and repair manuals, as well as protections against greenwashing and premature disuse.

OBJECTIVES

The main objective of the Life-EPICS project is to improve the sustainability within the  electrical and electronic equipment value chains, through 3 main measures implemented by the largest retailer in the sector: 

 

1. creation of a product ‘sustainability’ label which consumers can easily understand
2. training of sales staff so they understand the concept of product sustainability and can communicate the added value of products labelled as more sustainable to consumers
3. inclusion of a service in numerous stores to effectively repair some broken or faulty parts of electrical and electronic equipment

RESULTS

The project’s expected results are:

 

• development of an innovative ‘Electronic Products Sustainability Index,’ to be applied to electronic products on sale
• around 18 000 employees at 3 000 physical stores in Germany, Austria, France, Spain, Estonia and Latvia trained in sustainability, communication and best practices
  
• at least 48600 electronic products repaired under the ‘RepAir and ReLife corners’ pilot, in the 6 core countries
• reduction of energy consumption of:
  • 64.1 GWh over the project’s lifetime
    
  • 213.5 GWh over the 5-year period following the project’s end
• decrease in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions of:
  • 10 890 tonnes of CO2 emissions over the project’s lifetime
  • 36 300 tonnes of CO2 emissions over the 5-year period after the project’s completion