WEEE TRACE Layman's report

1. Layman’s Report
CIP Eco-Innovation Program:
ECO/10/277256/SI2.597845
WEEE TRACE
Full traceability
of the management of WEEE

2. Project Summary
WEEE TRACE project demonstrates the value of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to
ensure cradle-to-grave traceability of Waste from Electrical and Electronics Equipment (WEEE) flows in
order to raise their collection levels, reduce leaks to uncontrolled channels and guarantee these wastes
are conveyed to the appropriate treatment plants and minimize illegal exports or leaks to substandard
treatment. Additionally, proper identification of WEEE at treatment plants facilitates the identification of
hazardous substances and achieving increased reuse, recycling and recovery targets.
Project run pilot experiences in Spain and in the Czech Republic and has implemented the solution at the
complete waste collection and treatment chain of Fundación Ecolec in Spain. It is intended to use these
experiences to apply the solution to other European WEEE compliance schemes or to other waste streams
with similar control and traceability requirements.
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3. 3
Facts about WEEE TRACE Project
• More than 27 million kilogrammes of WEEE managed
with WEEE TRACE traceability by Ecolec in Spain.
• Real scale implementation of traceability solution at
more than 150 waste management actors in Spain,
from collection points to final recycling facilities.
• 20% time reduction in administrative tasks associated
to the management of documentation and reporting.
• 90% product identification through optical recognition
at ASEKOL in Czech Republic.
• More than 10% reduction in CO2 emissions per kilo-gramme
transported.
Project Goals
Demonstrate the value of ICT applications to guarantee traceability of wastes and/or facili-tate
the identification of WEEE key features e.g. manufacturer, model, etc. to ensure proper
treatment and finally achieve improve operational efficiencies.
Geographical coverage of WEEE TRACE
deployment at recycling facilities

4. 4
Project background
Although it has passed more than ten years since the first
European Directive on Wastes from Electronics Equipment
(2002/06/EC) entered into force, it is still challenging to
meet the collection and recycling objectives established in
this legislation. Reason is that given the positive value of
the materials present in these wastes or the high cost of
recycling up to two-thirds of their volume are either diverted
to substandard treatment or just illegally shipped outside
Europe.
MCCTELECOM, a company specialised in Information and
Communication Technologies based in Spain, had developed
a technological conceptual solution to facilitate the tracing
and tracking of materials and to facilitate the identification
of goods. Moreover, information would be transferred and
integrated in regular business management information plat-forms.
On the other side, two take-back compliance schemes with
responsibilities for wastes from electrical and electronics
equipment (WEEE), Fundación Ecolec in Spain and ASEKOL
in the Czech Republic, were struggling to address internal
challenges regarding traceability of wastes, minimise leaks to
uncontrolled channels and improve operational efficiencies.
Both sides, technological solution provider and market need,
shook hands and although recognized the potential validity
of the technological solution, it was at the same time clear
that it presented high technical, adaptation and economic
risks that affected its application in practice. Support was
needed to develop the pilot solutions and demonstrate its
validity in commercial applications at real scale.
Project Consortium and Application of
Project to Eco-innovation Programme
Based on the initial interest of these three initial actors, a
Consortium was created with the participation of six part-ners
representing the different elements of the life cycle of
electrical products from design to recycling.
• MCCTELECOM (Spain) as provider of the technological
solution
• FUNDACIÓN ECOLEC (Spain), collective compliance
take-back scheme for WEEE with interests in ensuring
traceability, minimizing leaks and improving operational
efficiency.
• ASEKOL (Czech Republic), collective compliance take-back
scheme for WEEE with interests in improving ope-rational
efficiency through the identification of product
features that would facilitate recycling and support im-plementation
of Producer’s responsibility principle
• FAGOR ELECTRODOMÉSTICOS (Spain), a supplier of whi-te
goods with interest in evaluating potential solutions to
track their products until their final recycling
• EMAÚS BILBAO (Spain), a logistics provider engaged in
the management of WEEE.
• FANE (Spain), a recycler of WEEE.
Additionally, SIGRAUTO, the main take-back scheme in
Spain for end-of-life vehicles and CARREFOUR, the large re-tail
chain, joined the consortium as observers to get access
to information from Project and also to share their expertise
in areas related to the project.
A Project application was presented to 2010 call of CIP Eco-innovation
Program managed by European Executive Agen-cy
for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI, now EASME)
highlighting the following specific objectives:
- Validate a surveillance and monitoring system based on
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for the
reverse logistics associated to WEEE management in Spain.
- Develop and test a pilot solution for the identification of
product key figures through optical identification.
- Improve collection levels and reduce leaks to uncontro-lled
channels
- Improve operational efficiencies in take-back schemes.
- Analyse and explore potential replicability of the solution
to other applications.
WEEE TRACE was among the 15% of projects finally se-lected
for grant (50%) in the 2010 CIP Eco-innovation call
initiating its activities in July 2011 with a 3 years duration
(ending in 2014). Project was selected with high ratings in
the areas of the quality of proposed actions, impact on mar-ket
and replication and its European added value.

5. 5
PROJECT ACTIVITIES
1. Definition of the technical solution
As a first phase MCCTELECOM, along with ECOLEC and
ASEKOL, developed the technical solution tailoring the avai-lable
technologies i.e. tracking solutions, ICT management,
geo-positioning, image capturing and management, etc. to
the specific needs of the Partners in the waste sector. This
took approximately one year since the project was initiated.
2. Project Implementation
ICT Solutions developed were different in Spain and in
Czech Republic due to the particular needs of the Custo-mers
in each case. In both cases, it required a pilot phase to
obtain the experience needed for a subsequent application
at full scale.
The experience in Spain
In Spain, pilot phase was performed from June to October
2012 in the Basque Region (north of Spain) engaging two
waste logistics partners and two recycling facilities covering
the different type of wastes to be managed. Pilot showed that
a single technological solution was not applicable and that it
had to be adapted to the different recycling technologies.
Based on the findings of the pilot, a deployment plan was
deployed and technological solution was implemented by
phases at 154 waste management actors of Ecolec’s supply
chain (19 more than initially planned). The whole project re-quired
a roll-out of 18 months and when it was fully imple-mented
in April 2014 the technological infrastructure was in
place at 57 recycling plants covering the whole geography
of Spain. One of the key elements of the deployment was the
training to waste management personnel that involved more
than 230 persons.
The technological solution involved the following key features:
• Tagging of WEEE units and batches at unit level with RFiD
and barcode tags.
• Tracing and tracking of waste shipments at unit level
• Image capturing and management
• Geopositioning
• Automation of the identification of incidences through
alerts (e.g. leaks) , simplified reporting and integration of
information in Company’s management IT platform.
Deployment of WEEE TRACE solution

6. 6
The total volume of WEEE managed during the duration of
the Project under the CIP Eco-Innovation umbrella (until July
2014) was of 27.177 metric tons and the main advantages
obtained were a better control of waste flows, a better mix
of WEEE fractions due to the reduction of leaks in WEEE with
material value, a reduction in the administrative tasks when
fully in place and an improvement in operational efficiency
since allowed to direct wastes to the most appropriate and
competitive recycling facilities. Anyway, this is not the end of
the Project and once in place will continue its operation at
Ecolec take-back scheme.
The experience in Czech republic
An identification solution for WEEE using optical sen-sing
methods was developed and subsequently tes-ted
by ASEKOL.
This system helps ASEKOL to provide better to ma-nufacturers
of electrical and electronic equipment
information on what quantities and what types of
WEEE were taken back and treated. It will also sup-port
the application of the most appropriate method
of treatment of WEEE for each type of WEEE (e.g.
iidentifying the content of hazardous substances in
the appliances) thanks to this solution designed and
therefore will contribute to achieve higher rates of
recycling and reuse of the materials contained in the
appliances.
Finally, one of the goals of the system is to acquire
data automatically, i.e. without unnecessary admi-nistrative
burden. The system has focused and solu-tion
has been adapted for TVs and computer moni-tors,
both CRTs and flat ones, due to the fact that this
waste stream creates approx. 80 wt. % of the WEEE
taken back by ASEKOL in the Czech Republic.
The designed solution achieves the identification
success rate higher than 90 %.
3. Exploration of Replication Opportunities
Particular emphasis has been dedicated to explore
replication opportunities. Although not commercial
contracts have been signed with other customers
during Project duration, there are on-going discus-sions
with different players for WEEE and other was-te
streams in Spain, France and even Brazil.
Prototype construction
Diagram of the system

7. 7
Moreover, a niche has been found in the retail sector,
interested in controlling leaks during in the household
collection phase. In order to address this opportunity,
Ecolec is actively including this upstream expansion
of the traceability solution in their offers to the large
retail chains in Spain in order to enlarge their custo-mer
base and increase the volumes of WEEE collec-ted
as required by new legislation.
4. Communication and Dissemination
A high level of attention has been given to the com-munication
and dissemination efforts, whose ac-tivities
and results can be summarized as follows:
- Web page (www.weee-trace.eu) in place that
includes a real time counter of WEEE trea-ted
and provides access to all public informa-tion
related to Project. More than 2.800 diffe-rent
visitors from 35 countries have accessed
to the page since it was created and presenta-tions
have been viewed more than 5.000 times.
- A descriptive video in Spanish, English and Por-tuguese
has been issued and is available at WEEE
TRACE channel in youtube. WEEE TRACE videos
(www.youtube.com/user/WEEETRACE) have been
viewed more than 1,000 times.
- Project was highlighted by the European Innovation
Partnership on Raw Materials in 2013 as one of the
initiatives to control waste flows and improve the
recovery of valuable materials.
- Project is connected to the Countering WEEE Ille-gal
Trade (CWIT www.cwitproject.eu) project led
by Interpol and has participated at their meeting
in Seville in June 2014. Additionally, discussions
have been held with the Basel Convention initiative
in Asia that aims to reduce illegal shipments of e-
Wastes to Asia.
- A project Workshop was organized in June 2014 in
Madrid with the participation of 62 persons. Satis-faction
of participants exceeded 88% for each of
the aspects analyzed.
- A WEEE TRACE group is active in LinkedIn with
more than 150 members and 75 discussions so far.
- More than 20 public presentations of Project have
been made in different forums to different audien-ces
in Spain, Germany, Czech Republic, Switzerland
and even in Brazil and United States.

8. Project benefits and Impacts
- Increase in waste collection and better management
of wastes. Reduction of leaks of wastes to
uncontrolled channels.
- Full traceability of waste flows.
- Improvement of operational efficiency in waste
management.
- Improvement in CO2 efficiency in transport.
- Reduction of administrative workload associated
to information management.
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9. In case you need more information, feel free to send a message
to info@weee-trace.eu or contact Project Coordinator
Mr. Josu Rollón (jrollon@mcctelecom.es)