Data Sources for Brand Data



The BDMS uses seven sources of recent brand counts from around the United States: 1) Florida Electronics Brand Distribution Study (2004/2005 data) ; 2) Hennepin County “Consumer Electronics Brand Tally” (2004); 3) Good Guys Electronics Take-back Pilot Project (2004, Washington State); 4) Staples Reverse Distribution Pilot (2004, New England states); 5) NCER West Virginia Collection Event Program (2006); 6) Kane County Collection (December 9, 2006, Illinois); and 7) Maine E-Waste Law Program (1/18/06 to 6/30/06). In addition, the BDMS also includes manufacturer claim status and registration data supplied by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection, the Maryland Department of the Environment, and the Washington Department of Ecology. Each of these sources provides data on brands of returned electronic products. When available, data from each program were compiled for televisions, monitors, desktop computers, laptop computers, and in a few occurrences, portable dvd players. While the data across all seven sources was generally compatible, differences across program data, such as brand name spellings and units of measure (units vs. weight) were harmonized manually by the NCER.

The number of total returned units varied substantially across the different programs with Hennepin County providing the largest sample size and the Kane County collection the smallest. Below are a few notes about each of the brand share studies: This is the only ongoing brand return share study not associated with a mandated state program. Although its sample size is still smaller than Hennepin County, it has a sophisticated data tracking program that allows users to track changes over time.

The largest of the four sample sizes, this study comes from the one of the longest-running and most successful electronics recycling programs in the country. This project was completed as part of the US EPA Plug-In To eCycling Program. This study and the collection program only covers televisions. Thus, these data are removed in any comparisons of units or weight combined across all product categories so as not to skew the report towards television brands. This project was also completed as part of the US EPA Plug-In To eCycling Program. TVs were not accepted in this program, and therefore no brand count data for TVs exists for this study. Like the Good Guys data source, these data are removed in any comparison of units or weight combined across all product categories so as not to skew the report towards the monitor, laptop, and desktop computer brands collected under this program. The NCER managed a series of collection events from February to September 2006 in 8 locations in West Virginia. At the event, NCER staff performed a brand count of all returned TVs, computer monitors, desktop computers, and laptop computers. The collection event program targeted West Virginia residents and small business and included a limit of 5-10 units per vehicle. This program recorded the brands of 1325 monitors, 512 TVs, 1195 desktops, and 52 laptops. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 5 tasked Booz Allen Hamilton (Booz Allen) to perform a brand sort for returned electronic devices at a collection event held on Saturday, December 9, 2006. The purpose of the brand sort was to provide EPA with data on the brands and corresponding weights of returned consumer electronic equipment during a typical local government collection event in Region 5. The data will be used to provide EPA and the Agency’s partners with baseline information regarding the specific types of equipment that are currently being returned at collection events in Region 5. Brands from a total of 943 units across TVs, desktops, laptops and monitors were recorded for this project. In the Spring of 2004, Maine passed a new law An Act to Protect the Public Health and the Environment by Providing for a System of Shared Responsibility for the Safe Collection and Recycling of Electronic Waste, (P.L. Chapter 661). Under the program established to implement this law, consolidators record brands of all covered electronic devices received from collectors. As of March 2007, this data source current includes data from January 18, 2006 (official implementation date of Maine law) to June 30, 2006. State-approved consolidators report to Maine DEP a count of brands from TVs, monitors and laptops on a semi-annual basis. For the first six months, this count totaled 24,608 units weighing more than 1.291 million pounds. Since the Maine law requires brand counting on an ongoing basis, new data will be added to the BDMS as soon as it is made available by the DEP. Since the Maine law does not cover desktop computers, these data should be excluded when running reports for the top brands across all four product categories.
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