E-Cycle Washington

Washington State Department of Ecology

Establishing a Return Share List

What Is Return Share?

The law defines "return share" as a manufacturer's percentage, by weight, of identified brands of covered electronic products (CEPs) returned for recycling.

The law directs Ecology to determine the return share for each manufacturer participating in either the Standard Plan or an Independent Plan. Ecology will determine return share by conducting sampling events at E-Cycle Washington processors throughout the year. These samples will provide data on the type, weight and brand owner of the CEPs returned for recycling in a calendar year.

In 2011, 34 sampling events were conducted. At those events, over 11,900 TVs, monitors and computers were randomly sampled and the data on each unit was recorded for use in determining return share by manufacturer.

As an example, a manufacturer whose brands totaled 2,000 pounds out of a total of 400,000 pounds sampled would have a return share of 2,000 divided by 400,000 with the result multiplied by 100 for a return share of 0.5% plus a proportional share of all "orphans." Orphans are CEPs for which a brand owner could not be determined or CEPs with brands owned by companies that have gone out of business. In this example, the manufacturer would be responsible for 0.5% by weight of all the electronics returned for recycling in that year. In 2011 the E-Cycle Washington program recycled 42.19 million pounds of electronics.

2012 Final Return Share Information

See Final 2012 Return Shares by Manufacturer.

See the list of Final 2012 Manufacturer Brands and Weights.

See the Final 2012 Orphan Brand Returns.

If you have any questions or comments about return shares, please contact:
Miles Kuntz
E-Cycle Washington Program Manager
(360) 407-7157
miku461@ecy.wa.gov