Congress calls on US to tighten eWaste laws

A Resolution has been introduced into US Congress asking the US to ban the export of environmentally damaging electronic waste to developing countries.

If successful, H. Res 1395 would bring the US in line with countries that ratified the Basel Convention, an agreement between 170 countries to regulate the international shipment of toxic waste.

Although the US has signed the Convention, it failed to ratify it, and still has many agreements with countries that receive its electrical waste.

According to the Resolution, 50 to 80 per cent of electronic waste collected for reuse or recycling in the US is exported to countries such as China, India, Ghana, Nigeria, and Pakistan. Televisions with cathode ray tubes contain between four and 15lbs of lead and are therefore particularly dangerous to children, it said.

"Congress has required the Nation's broadcasters to convert from analog to digital broadcasting on 17 February, 2009," added the Resolution. "A move which will render millions of analog CRT televisions obsolete for broadcasting and likely to be discarded."

The Resolution is largely symbolic, however. As opposed to concurrent or joint congressional resolutions, advanced by both houses, single-house resolutions are not signed by the president and do not become law. They are often used to express the general opinion of one house on a matter.