ST. GALLEN, SWITZERLAND – Companies exporting electronics to Switzerland should be advised of a new regulation for chemicals called the ChemRRV. According to a senior engineer at the EMPA Technology and Society Laboratory, ChemRRV bans the same substances outlawed in the RoHS directive.

Switzerland is not a member of the European Union, the body that ratified the RoHS directive.

However, says Guenter Grossmann of the EMPA, the ChemRRV “not only regulates the usage of a substance but also the handling.” In practice, he says, the combination of ChemRRV and RoHS would not only the presence of lead but its handling by untrained personnel, much in the way hydrochloric acid or other dangerous substances are controlled.