Five new RoHS exemptions close to approval

European Union states have approved five new exemptions to the RoHS directive on February 15. The exemptions won’t be official until they are published in the Official Journal of the European Union, but it’s very close.

The new exemptions include the following:

• Lead in linear incandescent lamps with silicate coated tubes.
• Lead halide as radiant agent in High Intensity Discharge (HID) lamps used for professional reprography applications.
• Lead as activator in the fluorescent powder (1 percent lead by weight or less) of discharge lamps when used as sun tanning lamps.
• Lead with PbBiSn-Hg and PbinSg-Hg in specific compositions as main amalgam in very compact Energy Savings Lamps (ESL).
• Lead oxide in glass used for bonding front and rear substrates of flat fluorescent lamps used for Liquid Crystal Displays (LCD).

These exemptions may only last until technology permits non-toxic substances to perform as well as the leaded versions of these products.

Original text is here