Effect of Replacement of Household Electrical Appliance Program on Chinese WEEE Recycling Industry

The replacement of household electrical appliance pilot program was launched on June 1, 2009 in nine regions of China, including Beijing, Shanghai, Zhejiang, etc. Due to the implement of this pilot policy, 14.1 million new household electrical appliances were sold, correspondingly 14.8 million old ones were replaced, and nearly 9 million waste electrical appliances were disassembled and were recycled by authorized treatment facilities (ATFs) in one year. 5 billion RMB Yuan has been granted as financial subsidies to consumers, most of them with lower incomes. For those ATFs, they will receive financial subsidies according to the amount and type of appliances transported, disassembled and recycled. Generally, the treatment subsidy varies from 5 to 20 RMB Yuan for one appliance, while transport subsidy 20-50 RMB Yuan. Promoted by the pilot program, ATFs reclaimed enough waste electrical appliances, so their treatment equipments can start to work in full load, and granted state financial subsidies ensured these ATFs reasonable profit. Now, a lot of new companies are preparing to invest in WEEE recycling industry for the huge market in China and industry stimulating policy. However, they have to lay out a practical scheme in advance to deal with some key factors, such as industry access qualification, type of recycling products, disassembling and recycling technologies and so on.