Under the Germany Act Governing the Sale, Return and Environmentally Sound Disposal of Electrical and Electronic Equipment (ElektroG) which came into force on August 13th 2005, the financing of collection and recycling of any waste electrical and electronic equipment (WEEE) arising from equipment bought before March 24th 2006 is the customer's responsibility. This is regardless of whether or not the old equipment is being replaced by a new item of equipment purchased from Corning. Waste arising from equipment purchased before March 24th 2006 is referred to as Historic WEEE.

Under the ElektroG Act, Corning are required to finance the collection, treatment, recycling and recovery of any new electrical and electronic equipment that you buy from the partners and resellers after March 24th 2006, when that new equipment eventually becomes waste. This is referred to as New WEEE.

Corning products are very competitively priced. Any new increase in operating costs for manufacturers such as Corning is normally reflected in a price increase in the product. However, instead of increasing the prices of our products, Corning has decided to share these new environmental costs directly with our customers. We believe in being transparent with you on any new environmental costs that our products need to address.

Our approach to sharing these new environmental costs is:

• Corning pays for the costs of treatment, recycling and recovery of the WEEE to meet the targets set by ElektroG.
• Corning pays for the costs of data management and reporting to the Federal Environmental Agency (UBA) to demonstrate compliance with all administrative requirements of ElektroG.
• You pay for transportation of your WEEE to Corning's appointed recycler in Germany.

Corning has established a recycling contract with the European Advanced Recycling Network (EARN) and will cover any costs of treatment, recycling and recovery of the equipment on arrival at the EARN facility in Germany. All New WEEE that arises from the purchase of Corning products is classed as non-hazardous waste.

It is your responsibility to arrange and pay for costs collection and transportation to EARN. Under German waste management regulations, you are free to use any carrier you wish to collect and transport non-hazardous WEEE to the EARN recycler.

For larger quantities of waste you may wish to contact the recycler directly in order to arrange and pay for an alternative collection method. The Corning recycler in Germany is:

In order to enable EARN to identify Corning equipment upon arrival at the recycler's address, please download the Recycling Label for German Customers. Complete the label with your company details and attach it to a suitable box for transport to EARN.