The world generates 40 million tons of PCs, cathode-ray tube screens, fax machines, game consoles, mobile phones and other e-waste every year and less than 20% of this waste is properly disposed of or recycled. In many parts of the world, these electronics are stripped of their precious metals and the unusable parts are dumped in landfills to poison the soil and groundwater.
China is the largest processor of e-waste receiving 70% of the world's end-of-life electronics. Guiyu is nicknamed the e-waste capital where workers burn circuit boards to recover computer chips, then soak the boards in acid to extract gold and lastly dump the leftovers into the Lianjiang River. This burning releases massive quantities of mercury, cadmium and other toxins into the air and most children here suffer from lead poisoning.
The Basel Action Network(BAN) is working to cease the export of toxic waste to developing countries, but when recycling a PC in the US costs $30 verses recycling it in China for $2, countries unfortunately go for the cheaper option. Instead, recycling companies in the US will charge for each PC to be disposed of then ship it overseas as 'scrap metal' to workers who are underpaid and unaware of the health affects of the chemicals these electronics possess.
The European Waste Electrical Directive law put responsibility for the disposal of e-waste to the producers, importers and retailers of the electronic good, so that companies are compelled to take back end-of-life products and refurbish them. But a law such as this is very difficult to enforce. Sony became the first electronics company to offer unlimited free take-back and recycling for all its products and I hope more companies will follow its example.
Most reputable e-waste recyclers are ISO 14000 certified. The ISO 14000 are environmental standards created to guide organizations in minimizing their operations affect on air, water and land. It takes in how a product is produced rather than the product itself such as labeling, performance evaluation, life cycle analysis, communication and auditing.
The ultimate goal for e-waste recycling is for zero to land in the landfills and 100% recovery of materials. A typical PC contains 23% plastic, 32% ferrous material, 18% non-ferrous material and 12% electronic boards made of gold, palladium, silver and platinum. Recycler shredders use heavy duty shredders that reduce the e-waste into uniform rough pieces that are then sorted. This sorting has been found to be profitable. In LCD mobile phones, the rare metal indium can be recovered and sells anywhere between $700/kg to $1,000/kg.
New ways to more efficiently recycle are continuing to be invented such as the Titech X-tract Seperator and Finder. X-tract sends x-rays through unsorted nonferrous metal shreds and sorts the material by comparing the relative brightness of the x-ray images. Japanese electronics maker NEC is also experimenting with bioplastic that would degrade in 7 years.
China is switching from building technology parks to recycling parks that have attracted 22 recycling companies. They are doing aluminum harvesting, processing of computer chips, cables, motherboards for gold, silver and metal harvesting and all leftovers go into making cement. A 90% recovery system and a model for how e-waste recycling can be done in the future.
Krikke, Jan. "Recycling e-Waste:The Sky is the Limit." IT Professional Magazine. Jan 2008: 50-55. Web. 2 Dec. 2013. <http://search.proquest.com/docview/206326082?accountid=14679>.
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