In November of 2004 I attended a 2 day Lead-Free seminar.  Upon
returning home I did a little digging and came up with a paper stating
that of the materials leaching out of landfills (assuming SAC solder
waste is there) the level of copper and silver would be well in excess
of the EPA limits.

Phil

-----Original Message-----
From: Leadfree [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of John Burke
Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2006 4:51 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [LF] So much for lead free being environmentally friendly

I may be mistaken but I have never seen a press release or announcement
for the EPA report on Solders in Electronics: A Life-Cycle Assessment
[PDF]
<http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/dfe/pubs/solder/lca/lfs-lca-final.pdf>
(3.53 MB, 472 pages) 

 

This 472 page weighty tome was apparently published in August 2005.

 

I checked with a couple of industry peers and they never saw it either.

 

Interestingly, it appears that SAC alloy has a higher impact than tin
lead in a number of areas such as:

 

Non renewable resource use

Energy use

Global warming

Ozone depletion

Water Quality

 

I understand why this report might not be widely heralded by those with
a commercial interest in lead free replacements, but as a US tax payer I
for one would like the results of such an analysis to be widely read and
available should the decision ever have to be made for instance, for
reasons of reliability, to reverse the decision to remove lead from
solders in Europe.

 

For anyone thinking that I am "knocking" lead free - you are right -
there continues to be no reason to support it given that WEEE laws in
Europe mean that electronics never end up in a landfill anyway so
leaching arguments and measurement methods are somewhat academic.

 

I do however have a passionate concern for the environment. It makes me
mad when I see that the "environmentally friendly" replacement for
eutectic leaded solder is actually having a much greater impact on non
renewable resources. Check out tables ES-4 and ES-5. 

 

From the report:

 

2The difference between SAC and SnPb is 453 kg of NRR per 1,000 cc of
solder applied. If this were all

automotive gasoline, this difference is equivalent to 162 gallons of
gasoline. Assuming a driver consumes 20

gallons per week, this is also equivalent to approximately 8 weeks of
driving.

 

Anyway for environmentalists and engineers everywhere here is the link:

 

http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/dfe/pubs/solder/lca/index.htm

 

 

Kind regards,

 

John Burke


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