Making the switch to leadfree electronic products (or nearly leadfree, as
the RoHS draft directive has some exemptions) is costing a lot of companies
a lot of money. It appears that most of the money is of the non-recurring
variety, that is, figuring out what to do and investing in equipment to do
it. Is it possible yet to estimate the additional recurring (non-amortized)
costs of building a product leadfree? Out of necessity auto manufacturers
produce versions of their cars with the steering wheel on the left and on
the right. The situation is different for electronic products, but with
sufficient economic incentive, might some manufacturers decide to produce a
leadfree version for Europe and a leaded version for elsewhere? Also, if two
versions of a particular product were to be commercially available, would
European customs inspectors be able to keep the citizens of their countries
from buying the leaded version, and for how long?


Gordon Davy
Baltimore, MD
[log in to unmask]
410-993-7399

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