Editor's note: This article is the first of two addressing the problems posed by aging electronic devices entering the waste stream. See also, Laws Fail to Keep up with Mounting E-Trash

With the holiday season officially upon us, the hunt is on for the hottest cell phones, flat-screen plasma TVs and video game systems. This seasonal new tech surge will no doubt please gadget lovers, but it will also result in a heap of old electronic devices being dumped into a waste stream already awash in refuse laden with cadmium, lead, mercury and other toxins.

A projected increase in toxic trash—such as analog television sets expected to become obsolete by the end of 2009—has government agencies and environmental watchdogs pushing for recycling options and the use of environment-friendly components in new devices. Still, it's a message that consumers and device manufacturers have yet to take to heart even as more products flood the market.

The electronics industry generates about $2 billion in U.S. sales annually, according to a report ("Management of Electronic Waste in the United States") released by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in April. The Consumer Electronics Association, an Arlington, Va.–based trade group says that Americans owned some three billion electronic devices in 2005, the latest year for which data is available, despite tossing or recycling about 304 million electronic devices that same year. About two thirds of the discarded devices were still functioning, upping the danger that they would crack during transport or when crushed by garbage trucks, tossed into landfills or incinerated (more of an issue in developing countries), thereby releasing toxic chemicals into the environment.

Two years ago, the U.S. generated an astonishing 2.6 million tons of electronic waste, which is 1.4 percent of the country's total waste stream. Only 12.6 percent of this so-called "e-waste" was recycled. Worse, e-waste is growing faster than any other type of trash the EPA regulates, including medical and industrial waste. Unwanted cell phones, televisions, PCs (including desktops, laptops, portables and computer monitors), computer peripherals (including printers, scanners and fax machines), computer mouses and keyboards amounted to more than 1.9 million tons of solid municipal waste in the U.S.; of that, more than 1.5 million tons were dumped primarily into landfills, whereas the rest was recycled, the EPA says.

A projected increase in sales will add to the growing e-junk pile. The EPA estimates that roughly 283 million PCs will be sold in 2008, up from 255 million this year. And these new computers are pushing the old models out the door at a rapid pace: U.S. residential and business users scrap about 133,000 PCs daily. Cell phones are also quickly becoming part of the waste stream. More than one billion mobile phones shipped worldwide in 2006, according to Framingham, Mass.–based technology research firm IDC—22.5 percent more than the 832.8 million units shipped a year earlier. By 2008, the United Nations Environment Programme (the U.N.'s environmental arm) projects that the number of cell phone users around the world will climb to two billion. Meanwhile, 130 million of these devices are thrown out annually.

7 Comments

1. 1. MadRob85 03:13 PM 11/30/07

   I work for a company in Janesville, Wisconsin that deals with the recycling of CRT Class, PC's, LCD's, and other general electronics. It amazes me to see the amount of "stuff" that comes through here on a daily basis. I'm the Data Security Manager at this facility I run the PC department on a daily basis we dismantle roughly 200 PC's. On a daily basis we repair roughly 80 older PC's for resale. We process thousands of pounds of glass from CRT monitors daily. We average over 30,000+ pounds of general electronics daily for processing. If you add all that up you're looking at unbelievable numbers, and that number is growing exponentially. Before working here I never would have imagined that e-waste was this bad but we are facing a serious problem here. Its great to see companies that are stepping up and setting an example but its going to take allot more than that if you don't believe me look up a local e-waste facility and go take a tour. We need to get a hold on this problem and fast!

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2. 2. Monita 04:31 PM 11/30/07

   Great article. Companies should stop caring so much for selling millions, and start caring more about the consequences of their products. Before overwhelming the market with cool new gadgets, and bombing consumers with their marketing strategies, they should take seriously their responsibility with e-waste and the environment. This article is very illuminating.

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3. 3. larrygreenemeier 09:57 PM 11/30/07

   Thanks for your comments on the story. It's a topic I'll continue to address as new developments unfold.

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4. 4. j damon 03:10 PM 12/1/07

   Removing these components from our "back yard", exporting them to countries where the environmental laws are more lax is not the answer. We the developed countries who produce, use and profit from these products must first clean up the mess of our past mistakes and at the same time move toward "greener" IT.

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5. 5. j damon 03:27 PM 12/1/07

   Moving our IT wast off site onto another country where the environmental laws are lax is not a responsible answer to our problem. We need to handle these problems with all due respect to all the nations an people. Then we must move to greener technologies. We must think in radical ways with materials before ignored or politically discredited. Plastics can be replaced with more earth friendly biodegradable materials that have been around for EVER, but who's genetic family makes it a political "hot potato." We need to touch this "third rail" in material science and develop this material to its best degree and move from there to get even better stronger materials that are earth friendly. This is most "DO-able. " If we can just wrestle the chemistry sets away from the oil kids who think they have all the power and all the answers. Well their power is finite and their answer is: more, more, more. It's time to make them play nice with the rest of the world or else get out of the way

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6. 6. sculptmud 08:45 AM 1/25/08

   Where do old mobiles and computers go to die? Read about it in the latest National Geographic - it's absolutely hideous. Out of sight is out of mind. No local municipality wants it all at the local tip - so it disappears.
   E waste is actually poisoning children before being swept out to sea. It then forms an island that is expanding with every piece of outdated gear that gets trashed.

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7. 7. sculptmud 08:46 AM 1/25/08

   I've never owned a mobile phone and I have lived without a computer or electricity quite happily.  How many millions of other people out there will be virtually robbed of their identity and means of survival if and when the plug does finally fall out?  We may yet be forced to transcend the machine age. What will you do?
   
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   Edited by sculptmud at 01/25/2008 1:02 AM

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