Costs of recycling Understanding of economics of recycling cannot be decoupled from understanding the cost structure of companies and various cost components: • Capital Costs: All assets related to the processing of waste (buildings, machines, equipment, patents, etc.); • Technical Costs, divided into: — office, Administrative and overhead: all costs related to personnel not directly working in production; — operational Costs - basics: all costs related to depollution, processing, proper waste disposal, etc; — operational Costs - quality & service: all costs related to quality, waste characterization , proper reporting, and compliance with best available technology – BAT and standards, etc. The study includes the operational Costs - basics and operational Costs - quality & service. other costs com- ponents such as capital costs and office, administrative and overhead costs are not considered in this study. introduction The EU WEEE Directive entered into force in 2003 and in 2015 approximately one-third of the total volume of electrical and electronic equipment (EEE), that was put on the market (Pom), was reported as collected and treated in compliance with this Directive. Various factors affect the functioning of the regulated market of WEEE collection and treatment, in particular: 1. The positive intrinsic value of certain WEEE products/components, 2. The volatility of the commodity prices resulting from the treatment, 3. The costs arising with the compliance of legal re- quirements in logistics, depollution and labour, and 4. The widespread selective “scavenging” of products, components and materials, which hinders overall quality in treatment. some factors are dependent on dynamics not under control of the recycling industry or players involved in the end-of-life phase (like the market value of com- modities or the material composition of products), while others are directly linked with the compliance with legal requirements and distortions happening on the market.