Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-12-12-Speech-1-081"
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"en.20051212.14.1-081"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, Mr Blokland deserves our warm thanks for this good, thorough and careful report for second reading.
The basic problem with batteries and accumulators has nothing to do with the energy they produce, but rather with the materials that they contain – cadmium, lead and mercury. It is a matter of general knowledge that these components are toxic and do the environment no good at all. As I see it, the first priority is recycling rather than management; the next is that they be replaced by less toxic contents wherever this is technically possible. This alteration now further renders harmless, reduces and, to some degree, prohibits these materials and their percentages by weight in batteries of whatever kind. This I regard as the great benefit of this directive.
It has to be admitted that the collection quotas are very high, and the demands made on industry, the general public and the trade very considerable. This is a challenge, and it is one that I regard in an extremely positive light; it will involve putting into practice a learning programme that will get our fellow human beings treating the environment better and becoming more aware of it. Even if it proves impossible to achieve the high quotas everywhere and always, the requirement is evidence of how the European Union leads the world in its awareness of the environment and in the way it treats it. The debate as to whether it makes more sense to define collection targets in terms of weight or number of items strikes me as purely academic.
I have no objection to the joint legal basis using Articles 95 and 175 of the Treaties, or to the Council’s Common Position. Looking at the big picture, the fundamental question that presents itself to my mind is whether the promotion of research and of modern technologies will, over the coming years, enable us to replace many of our conventional batteries with such alternatives as fuel cells. If it does, then this directive, like the materials we have problems with, will have a limited lifespan."@en1
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