On March 15, 2018, China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) published the Announcement № 15 “Catalogue for the Standard Compliance Administration of the Restricted Use of Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Products (First Batch)”. This document implements the Order № 32 of 2016 known as “China RoHS 2” and includes the list of the first 12 products subject to mandatory hazardous substance restrictions as well as the list of 39 exempted applications. The Announcement sets down an implementation date of March 12, 2019 for the listed products to fulfill substance restriction requirements.

China RoHS 2 Compliance Catalogue contains the following product types that are subject to substance restrictions:

• Refrigerators (up to 800 liters)  
• Air conditioners (≤ 14,000 watts)  
• Washing machines (≤ 10 kg of dry clothes)  
• Electric water heaters  
• Printers (≤ A3, ≤ 60 pages / minute)  
• Copiers (≤ A3, ≤ 60 pages / minute)  
• Fax machines  
• Televisions  
• Monitors  
• Microcomputers (desktop with necessary peripherals, laptops, and tablets)  
• Mobile communication devices  
• Telephones

China RoHS 2 restricts the use of the following six hazardous substances in electrical equipment:

• Lead and its compounds  
• Mercury and its compounds  
• Cadmium and its compounds  
• Hexavalent chromium compounds  
• Polybrominated biphenyls (PBB)  
• Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE)

The MIIT has also settled on an exemption list, providing 39 exemptions on uses of foregoing restricted substances in electrical and electronic products, such as fluorescent and incandescent lamps, heating, ventilation, air conditioning, and refrigeration equipment (HVACR), etc. Only one exemption is time-limited — the use of mercury in high-pressure vapor lamps (HPMV). It is set to expire on December 31, 2020.

However, the "Conformity assessment system" defined by the government under Article 18 of China RoHS has yet to be formalized with precise requirements for the listed products remain unclear. This is the next anticipated phase in the development of China RoHS 2 and will complete its evolution.

The official document is available here.

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The information has been prepared by the GMA Consult Group team. ‍

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