I was interested to read some blatant misinformation in a recent article from Earth911 that 99% of all e-waste is recycled.

Because according to the US EPA only 12.5% of disposed e-waste is recycled (Municipal Solid Waste In the United States, 2005 Facts and Figures, October 2006). And for good reason - 87.5% of it is non-recyclable!

Only 12.5% of the consumer electronic products bought were “recovered” in 2005. This compares with an average recovery rate of  32.1% for all other categories

Important Fact about E-Waste and Recycling that the green coalition of electronics manufacturers don’t want you to read.

These are quantifiable statistics concerning the issues of electronic waste and the ongoing e-waste recycling methods currently deployed. All facts and figures are backed by source and where possible I have made a link to the original data. These facts and figures were originally compiled for both legislators as well as advocates of environmental policy studies. Since its compelation in 2006, the statistics have been updated where possible. This list will be updated as new statistics are released.
Research includes Facts and figures from the Electronics TakeBack Coalition (2006) last updated in June 2008

What is the latest estimates of E-waste expansion globally?

The estimated amount of extra e-waste created each year is 400 million units

At the current growth rates 3-4 billion units will be scrapped from now until 2010. This equated to  an average of 400 million units plus a year. (International Association of Electronics Recyclers 2006)

More than 130,000 computers are trashed EACH DAY in the USA

Today, this estimate is more like 250,000.  This previous estimate was drawn up by Gartner in 2003.

In their Electronics Recovery Recycling Baseline Report in 1999, the National Safety Council predicted that there could be up to 500 million obsolete computers in the US by 2005. This estimate has been confimred by Gartners findings in 2005.

More than 20 million computers and televisions are added to home storage each year.

This means that a huge amount of e-waste is out there but currently being stored in people’s homes.
According to the EPA about 57 million PCs and TVs are bought by households and businesses each year in the United States. These don’t necessarily replace the older versions of the same electronic. This is particularly true with products such as Cellphones which notoriously stay in a bottom draw for some years. Consumers (both business and household) frequently store their retired products.

Experts agree that the average home will be hoarding three or more units somewhere in their home. However, this figure is much bigger with businesses holding older computers. Up to 24 million TVs and PCs are added to their storage each year. This storing or hoarding is predicted to accelerate thanks to new Plasma and LCD TVs. New digital broadcasting are likely to negate any resale value  old TVs might have.

Cell phones

Over 130 million mobile phones or cell phones are trashes each year (USA)

This equates to more than 2.5 million tons of e-waste (2005)

And contrary to figures published by the industry, nearly 90% of this waste in irreclaimable.

2.6 million tons of e-waste was generated in 2005, and the EPA notes that only 12.6% was recycled:

       As in recent previous updates of this report, generation of selected consumer electronic products was estimated as a subset of miscellaneous durable goods. In 2005, an estimated 2.6 million tons of these goods were generated. Of this, approximately 330,000 tons of selected consumer electronics were recovered for recycling. Selected consumer electronics include products such as TVs, VCRs, DVD players, video cameras, stereo systems, telephones, and computer equipment.“

Each year up to 50 million tons of e-waste get dumped

       Some 20 to 50 million metric tonnes of e-waste are generated worldwide every year, comprising more than 5% of all municipal solid waste. When the millions of computers purchased around the world every year (183 million in 2004) become obsolete they leave behind lead, cadmium, mercury and other hazardous wastes. In the US alone, some 14 to 20 million PCs are thrown out every year. In the EU the volume of e-waste is expected to increase by 3 to 5 per cent a year. Developing countries are expected to triple their output of e-waste by 2010.

E-waste is the fastest rising waste stream in the US 

The amount of consumer electronic actually rose by 8% from 2004 to 2005 to 2.63 million tons, a higher rate than any other category of  waste. This is at a time when all other sources of waste are falling.

Location and Numbers of Old Electronics

How Much Electronic Waste Gets Recycled or Stockpiled?

     Only 12.5% of disposed e-waste is recycled

Only 12.5% of the consumer electronic products bought were “recovered” in 2005. This compares with an average recovery rate of  32.1% for all other categories

     68% of consumers stockpile

“68 percent of American stockpile their old computer equipment at home.”

9% of all products sold between 1980 and 2004 are still in storage

Source: EPA “Electronics Waste Management in the US: Preliminary Findings. Presentation by Clare Lindsay, U.S. EPA, Office of Solid Waste to the E-Scrap Conference in Austin, TX, October 18, 2006. These are preliminary numbers (still under review) to be presented in a final report by the EPA in 2007.

Of all products sold between 1980-2004, almost half are still in use either by the first or subsequent owners.
• About 42 percent have already been managed via recycling or disposal.
• 9 percent are being stores or hoarded
• Half of these are TVs
• A quarter of these are PCs

• A little over 20% percent were re-used by a second owner.

Sales of Electronics

a. Sales in Computing

       In 2007 worldwide computer sales reached 260 million. Over 67 million were bought in the US.

267.7 million computers were sold globally in 2007, up 32 million from 2006 (IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker). 67 million of these were sold in the USA. These include Desktops, Notebooks, Laptops, Ultra Portables or Mobile Computers and x86 Servers. This oes not include hand helds such as PDAs.

        An estimated 430 million computers will be sold in 2012

This year, in 2008, it is estimated by industry analysts that over 300 million computers will be bought, with over  70 million going to the US. This will increase to 430 million by 2012,(85 million in the US)

b. Sales of TVs

       This year we bought 3.9 MILLION TVs for the SUPERBOWL alone!

National Retail Federation says we’ll be purchasing 4 million TVs just for this year’s 2008 SUPERBOWL. That’s up more than 50% from last year. In 2006 in the same period we bought 1.7 million.

 In 2008 32 million digital TVs wil be sold in the US

As of December 2007 over 50% of US households now own a digital television. (The Consumer Electronics Association)

In 2007 $25 manufacturers made BILLION on digital TVs in the US.

According to new CEA sales projections, manufacturers are expected to announce an average of 11 percent revenue growth in excess of $25 billion in 2007 from digital TV sales. Additional rises of 13 percent revenue and 17 percent unit sales increase is estimated for 2008 (CEA).

Global TV sales in excess of  50 million a year

TV sales reached 50.6 million units per year (Q4 2006 to Q3 2007). TV revenues were over $26 billion for that period.

       83% of 50”+ screens are sold to the US

We love BIG TVs

c. Sales of cell phone or mobiles

Globally over one billion cell phones were sold in 2006

A new milestone was reached in 2006, with over one billion cellphones shipped and sold that year. (IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker).  That’s a 22.5% rise from 2005

       By 2008, cell phone usage is expected to reach two billion (UN).

In the US the amount of cell phone subscribers increased from 340,000 in 1985 to 180 million in 2004. Globally, cell phone sales have increased from 100 million units in 1997 to 780 million units in 2005.

Cell phone sales are projected to exceed 1 billion units per year in 2009, with an estimated 2.6 billion cell phones in use by the end of that year (USGS).

       We purchased more than $160 BILLION consumer electronics in 2005

“15 percent of this spend was made online (CE) a jump of 5% from 2004, according to a study released today by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)®. “

      Global consumer electronics sales was $618 BILLION in 2005

What is recoverable from recycling consumer electronics?

Gold:

One ton of e-waste from PCs has more gold in it than 17 t of gold ore.

Resources Used in Electronics Manufacturing

           It takes 530 pounds of fossil fuels, 48 pounds of chemicals and 1.5 tons of water to produce 1 single PC with its monitor

The UN study found that making  a PC and monitor uses 240 kg (530 pounds) of fossil fuel, 22 kg (48 pounds) of chemicals and 1.5 tonnes of water. This is more than the weight of a rhinoceros or a car (Kuehr and Williams, 2003). Making consumer electronics is an extreme burden not only on the environment but also on the demand for fossil fuels. This far exceeds any other household or business product.

Does reusing and re-selling pre-owned computers create more jobs than disposal?

Absolutely.  Computer re-use creates 296 more jobs for every 10,000 tons of material disposed each year - compared to computer disposal

WALL-E is one of the better animations to come out of the Disney Pixar creative collaboration.

It’s a heart warming tale of WALL-E, a Waste Allocation Load Lifter - Earth Class unit. The lovable robot manages to stay functional after 700 years of service by recycling bits of other WALL-E robots which have perished over the centuries of cleaning up the Earth.

A thousand years earlier in the 21st Century, the Buy ‘N’ Large corporation had (miraculously) taken over every single service on Earth, including the government. They are to blame for the rampant over production and subsequent pollution that ensues - turning Earth into a wasteland of e-waste and junk - void of humans, who generations later, remain living lethargically on a space cruiser many light years away.

The Buy ‘N’ Large corporation is a more acceptable bad guy to portray than the dozens of consumer brands who benefit from today’s throw away society.

A more realistic landscape (the one we see today in Asia) would be the mountains of e-waste filled with broken Sony plasma screens, Panasonic DVD players and colored iPod shells. This later imagery would never have gotten passed Disney’s largest stock holder.

The real message to be taken from this summer’s No. 1 blockbuster is that most of what makes up e-waste today is non recyclable and has absolutely nowhere to go.

    only about 12% of the e-waste we produce is recycled. The rest will joint the mountains of e-waste which one day might challenge the Himalayas.

We see the pictures of Chinese villagers picking their way through circuit boards and recovering the poisonous alloys and by-product, but this only makes up about 12% of the junk that we ship to them. The rest stays strewn across the countryside on e-waste dumps which closely resemble the make believe ones depicted in WALL-E.

If the electronics we produce today are largely non recyclable, why is the drive towards recycling them so prevalent, when a drive to re-use them or make them last longer goes relatively unheard?

So long as the green back is more powerful than the green lobby, more funds will be driven towards green perception than green reality - The burying of the National Computer Recycling Act is testament to this. Only when every bit of electronics is recyclable (and this includes Xbox, Playstation, Wii too) will we be able to start slowing the acceleration of e-waste dumping.

Until the Utopian vision of green electronics magically appears - which will be decades away at best - consumers need to look at other ways to lower the rising tide of e-waste: Buy a pre-owned or used computer, digital camera, cell phone or any electronics device when you can.

When you buy something new you add to the e-waste pile - when you buy used you don’t.

Sell pre-owned or used as well. If you don’t use your old computer, DVD player, cell phone, digital camera or camcorder any more, trade it in or sell it pre-owned  or used so that someone else will buy it from you instead of buying it new and adding to e-waste themselves.

For additional trust, buy used off of a pre-owned retailer who is willing to give a one year warranty on your purchase. That way, you have as much confidence as buying new.

With companies like trade 2 save launching to give consumers more confidence in the pre-owned and used consumer electronics market, we hope that more consumers will take matters into their own hands and prevent the e-waste catastrophe so beautifully animated in WALL-E.

For those of us who don’t enjoy the eBay experience and just want to trade-in our old laptops for an upgrade, Sony Style has the answer. You can trade in your old laptop or desktop using their online calculator to get credit towards any new purchase at Sony Style.

The trade and save format is proving very successful at Sony and fits in perfectly with their environmental program.

Sony are keen to voice their environmental credentials…

     Sony does not want anything to go to waste which could potentially harm the environment if improperly disposed. At the same time, Sony wants to make recycling beneficial and convenient for you. That’s why we offer the Sony Notebook Trade-in Program. We’ll not only dispose of your notebook in an environmentally safe manner, we’ll also give you credit towards a new VAIO PC.

So we took them at their word. I have an old Pentium 3 Dell Laptop so was keen to learn how much trade-in value they’d give me for the laptop they were going to responsibly dispose of for me.

Strangely I got this response:

     We are sorry but your notebook is ineligible for trade-in

But I thought that…

     Sony does not want anything to go to waste which could potentially harm the environment” and that you “not only dispose of (my) notebook in an environmentally safe manner, (you’ll) also give (me) credit towards a new VAIO PC.

Oh well. I suppose my old laptop is just too old to be recycled.

But hang on, I’ve also got this mint condition used once IBM Core 2 Duo with 2 GHz, 200 Gig Hard Drive, Blue tooth, DVD +-

Ah… Sony’s Value Calculator is much more interested in disposing of this terrible piece of unwanted e-waste. In fact, they’ll even give me a whopping $413 trade-in credit for it!!

That’s amazing! Because according to eBay, I should be getting $1650 for it used! Thank you Sony - We’re really happy you’re heart is in the right place when it comes to the environment.

I wonder if some of the laptops on eBay are actually from Sony Style? What a business! 400% mark up for what they buy them for from Joe public. They only make 15% mark up on new stuff. They should go into the trade-in business. Oh yes - they have.

Of course, Sony’s trade and save venture will soon be having a little unwanted competition in the form of trade 2 save, where people will be able to trade-in their used laptops and other consumer electronics for decent prices. They’ll be able to buy and sell in the same online store or trade for an upgrade. Trade 2 save will only buy, sell or trade used or pre-owned products in graded conditions, including computer hardware, consumer electronics, cell phones, gaming and movies. Because trading pre-owned consumer electronics and their consumables is a sure fire way of tackling e-waste.

I find it amazing that a company like Sony can so proudly brag about their trade in / re-cycling program on the one hand, and yet refuse to take anything in that they can’t sell on eBay for 4 times the price!

Some of the poorest communities in developing countries are swamped by e-waste from the west. This is old news. But so too is legislation to abolish this growing trade.

Back in 2005, members of Congress formed an “e-waste working group,” hoping to jump-start a federal recycling system to curb the e-waste traffickers. The head of that group, Rep. Mike Thompson (D-Calif.), proposed the National Computer Recycling Act.

It was designed to establish a grant and fee program through the Environmental Protection Agency to encourage and promote the recycling of used computers and to promote the development of a national infrastructure for the recycling of used computers, and for other purposes.
To help fund the national recycling program a fee would be taken from the retail sales of certain electronics.

Good news for the environmentalists, but not so for the consumer electronics giants who would foot the ‘recycling tax’.

The act soon ran into ‘implementation issues’, and three years later is still under review (along with the Palmer’s Act of 1864 which requires Amish to dress more fashionably).

Individual States have tried to follow European Legislation

Thirteen states including California, Washington, Maine, and Minnesota have agreed in principal to e-waste laws and support among other states is growing, in addition to new research initiatives.

In September 2007, the Green Chemistry Research and Development Act was proposed, looking to authorize $165 million over three years for research into products that reduce or eliminate hazardous waste. Sadly, however, the bill still awaiting a Senate vote, while lobbyists bide their time picking at its seams.

The Europeans got there in the end

Considering the sheer bureaucratic complexities of the European Union, after many delays, they did manage to set in stone the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) regulations governing the safe disposal of IT equipment. The new legislation went into effect July 1st, 2007.

Under the new law, electrical and electronic producers, rebranders and importers must pay for the responsible disposal and recycling of their goods. (It’s a bit like getting wriggly’s to chisel all their chewing gum off of pavements).
The first of its kind, but certainly not the last, the WEEE directive is setting the stage for future legislation.
With the high cost of disposing e-waste safely, it’s hardly surprising that the problem is still growing at an alarming rate - lower environmental standards and working conditions in China, India, Kenya and elsewhere have led to an exponential influx of e-waste, often entering through lucrative illegal channels.

The majority of e-waste ends up being broken down by ill-equipped laborers working under hazardous conditions.

A typical router or switch may contain more than 2 percent lead by weight and up to 38 separate chemical elements.

The Simplest solutions are often the most easily overlooked

In an effort to combat e-waste, reuse has become a new priority in the consumer market. Organizations including Apple, Dell, HP, and Sony are already instigating change by establishing trade-in and recycling programs ahead of legislation. With the shortening of product life cycles, consumers can also buy, sell or trade used consumer electronics and computers at trading portals. By doing this, a product’s lifespan can be increased by up to 4 times, significantly lowering the amount of ewaste heading for China.

              Gartner estimates the energy from manufacturing, distribution and use of information and communications technology emits approximately 2 percent of total global carbon dioxide, equal to the emissions from the entire airline industry.

Gartner analyst Simon Mingay estimates that one in every dozen computers used worldwide is a “secondary computer,” and nearly 152.5 million used systems are shipped annually. The research firm predicts that both the home and professional markets for secondary PC’s will continue to see growth in the next several years, fueled by better performance, longer system life and recycling legislation that would give companies greater incentives for reuse and recycling.

Buying pre-owned hardware is not only a cost effective way to reduce IT costs, it is also perfectly aligned with e-waste reduction.

Organizations of all kinds can benefit from reuse, in ways that tangibly affect the bottom line and intangibly help save the environment.

In order for this to happen, more pressure needs to be implemented to enforce the kind of environment which would make widespread reuse both attractive and feasible.

It’s what we’re being told to do by every consumer electronics institution on the block, from Best Buy to Apple. But what actually happens to that monitor or PC once we drop it off and slip back into our Prius’s, tutting smugly at passing Hummers?

Well don’t feel so green greenies, because although your PC will no longer end up in a landfill somewhere in Alabama, it WILL be sold by the tonnage (for a healthy profit I might add) to the highest bidding e-waste merchant, who’ll then pile it high on a gas guzzling tanker to be shipped off to Hong Kong. From there it will be resold to another trader until it eventually ends up on the swelling e-waste dumps of China.

Yes - these pictures are real, and these children do die of lead and mercury poisoning as they blow-torch or hack their way through millions of circuit boards.

Still - there are plenty of children where she came from when she reaches a life expectancy of 15 - and plenty of throw-away PCs, laptops, monitors, MP3 players, speakers, headphones, cellphones etc to grow the never ending mountain of e-waste being created to the rapturous sound of iTunes.

I make no secret of my suspicion of recycling programs and the greener than green recycling stores, many of whom actually charge to recycle your e-waste, only to make a clean (or dirty) profit as they shift it along the dirt never ending conveyor belt to China.

Is there an alternative? For an eight year old PC maybe not - none of the internals are up to date, but the real crime is that most of the stuff ending up on e-waste dumps today are between 2 and 3 years old.

The bottom line is that most people today upgrade after about a year or so and leave their old laptop or cellphone lying around in a bottom draw until it’s no longer any good to anyone - before driving down to that (ever so lovely) environmental store with green tea and rose who’ll take it off your hands for $15 - you’ll get back into your Prius, tut at a Hummer and - well I think we’ve been here several million consumers before - Oh what a gravy train - an industry booming at both ends!

If people sold their one or two year old digital cameras, PCs, laptops, cellphones as pre-owned, and if possible, upgraded to another pre-owned but up to date model, then the e-waste merchants would suddenly find their business cut by 75% within a couple of years. The buy, sell or trade pre-owned model as advocated by new trading portal trade 2 save needs to feature strongly in the minds of Americans if the problem of ewaste is to be tackled in the short to medium term.

The downside to this, of course, is that the profits of Sony, Apple, Samsung and Acer among others would suffer from fewer sales. But then, is this such a terrible thing? We love the things they give us, but at some point we have to conclude that it may be too much of a good thing.

Upgrading to stay ahead with technology is becoming more and more important. It’s about time that as Americans we started to do it responsibly - oh and guess what - you’ll say a fist full of dollars too!

The most worrying aspect about the current energy crisis is that there appears to be no short term solutions in terms of demand. Energy Consultant Dominic Whittome of Mainline Energy advocates the increased use of nuclear power as the most effective medium term sollution, however any new stations are unlikely to come online in any significant numbers for another 8-10 years, leaving America in a potential 1930’s style depression and the rest of the World in a food crisis for the short term.

Ironically a 1930’s style depression would significantly reduce demand for energy and bring down oil prices to about $30-40 a barrel, but a depression is hardly the solution we should be seeking.

What I have done here is try to put together 10 realistic measures that Americans can do as individuals, that if done in mass, would greatly reduce world oil prices and increase living standards in the short term whilst we wait for nuclear power stations if the political will allows it and more renewable energies in the long term.

1. Stop using the Shopping Mall. What? are you crazy I hear you say. Well OK, I know it’s quite a social thing for some people, but realistically, driving to and from the shopping Mall equates to about 15% of petroleum needs for this country.
2. Buy Groceries off of the Internet. Think about it - a single Safeway van can deliver the groceries of 100 customers in one journey. Now turn that single van into 100 cars - do the Maths!
3. Buy Everything else off of the Internet and use land based postage. There is a certain amount of retail therapy that my wife, for one, will miss - so what’s a girl to do? To be honest, searching for that little black dress online can be equally as satisfying. Retailers like Victoria Secrets has an incredible online experience, and some retailers are even toying with the idea of online personal shoppers and utilizing the very latest in technology which will allow customers to download a body picture of themselves and place the clothes onto the model in a 3 dimensional landscape. The point is that a USPS or FED EX van (however polluting they are - and many run on natural gas now) - use up a tiny fraction of the millions of cars which go back and forth from the Malls every day! Also, freight trains move a ton of freight up to 423 miles on a single gallon of fuel. Most retailers also offer land based postage for free and guarantee delivery within 3-5 days.
4. Buy pre-owned or refurbished if you can. Our deteriorating buying habits of consumer electronics, gadgets, games, (anything manufactured in China or the Far East) has lead to a significant rise in e-waste as well as increasing energy demands. When you buy, sell or trade used or pre-owned consumer electronics, cellphones, or PC Hardware, you reduce the amount needed to be manufactured.
5. Reduce demand of imported products. Every time you upgrade your cellphone, iPod or computer for a new one, another one has to be made to fill that demand (by you). Making the product requires more energy than you’d think - a typical computer requires the equivalent of 4 gallons of petrol. This doesn’t include the energy needed to ship it to the US or the pollution created by the e-waste at the end of its (every shorter) lifecycle.
6. Increase product lifecycles of consumer products. A decade ago you’d have a camera for 7-10 years before replacing it - we usually replaced it when it broke. Now we don’t think twice about upgrading from the 8MP model to the 10MP model after a year or so. That’s 5 times more cameras being made to satisfy the MUST HAVE revolution in the industry. We can still have the latest iPODS, laptops, camcorders, cellphones etc, but don’t always buy them new.
7. Save money by buying pre-owned. The consumer electronics industry or Steve Jobs will certainly want to stop you from buying pre-owned - the industry as a whole has been making historic revenues as a direct result of shortening product lifecycles. They’ll lose money for sure, but don’t worry about the lowering of the demand having a negative effect on the economy.
8. Spend the money you save on local produce. Imported consumer electronics, computers and gadgets make up about 15-20% of your total outgoings after tax. (Staggering isn’t it - websites like Mint.com can show you in detail just how much money you’re putting away on these things). Buying pre-owned (and sometimes new when you had to) would reduce this figure to 3-5%, whilst still owning exactly the same kit in perfect working order. You’d only notice the difference in the first week. If most Americans did this we’d reduce the amount of tankers heading to the US by about 65%. That’s about 100% of the total energy demand of the global airline industry! The money you save, use on local produce which doesn’t require shipping across the globe. This will reduce demand for imports even further because you’ll be buying more stuff locally that you would have otherwise bought from abroad. In turn this would have a positive effect on our trade deficit too.
9. Only recycle with local recyclers who guaranty local disposal. It’s a sad fact that the Ned Flanders in us skip-a-rooneys along to deposit our recycling in the hapless belief that we’re doing the right thing. Some ‘Green’ recycling firms even charge significant recycling fees for your monitors, computers etc. What you may not realize is that it’s pure black gold to them. They pass it on for a further fee to a recycling exporter who then dumps it on a gas guzzling tanker to be shipped back to China destined to saturate the drinking water of local peasant populations with benzine and bromide.
10. Buy a Prius. OK, this last point is perhaps predictable, and living in San Francisco I am getting quite used to the sight of these things. These cars are much better than what the efficiency figures would suggest. Much of the petrol we use is spent sitting in traffic or behind a red light. A hybrid simply stops using energy when it stops moving. So the real efficiency should be judged by how many ‘real’ miles are traveled on a full tank of petrol. In reality you could easily double the efficiency of a Prius on top of what they are allowed to advertise. If you switch to a Prius expect to reduce your petrol consumption by 60% at the very least! I stick by the Prius because the other hybrids are so far behind in comparison. The Prius is streets ahead of the rest in terms of consumption. VW Golf are releasing a hybrid diesel at the end of 2009 which has better figures, however, with diesel currently at $4.75 in the Bay Area - I think it’s a non-starter.

So there it is - 10 ways that we could reverse the energy crisis NOW. Following these simple steps would have a dramatic and immediate effect. You’ll have more money in your pocket by following these rules, and you’ll be spending much more money on local goods as a result, which will stimulate the American economy instead of further stimulating the Chinese economy and our trade deficit with it.

These days its imperative to exhibit your inherent greenness, whether your a corporate titan like Chevron who allegedly hire militia to decimate local villages on the side, or a local grocer like Trader Joe’s who this week introduced shopping bags made from biodegradable EnviRo 6400.

Today also saw the launch of a new line of recyclable office supplies from Office Depot called “Office Depot Green“.

The line includes core supplies such as recycled paper, notebooks and file folders, as well as re-manufactured ink and toner cartridges, non-toxic cleaners and compact fluorescent light bulbs.

This comes on the back of their Tech Recycling Program launched last October. This involved selling boxes (with pre-paid postage) for $5, $10 and $15 (Apple does it for free) which customers fill with old electronics, though ironically, much of it may well get shipped out to China for a tidy profit.

Business takes the green dollar very seriously. Last year Best Buy initiated a program that sponsored drop-off events around the country, Wal-Mart held a pilot take-back day at 350 of its stores and HP announced it had reached one billion pounds of recycling sooner than expected.

Amazon also launched the now highly successful Green E-Commerce Page.

Whether buying green products or disposing of them responsibly, most American assume they’re helping the earth when they hand in their old computers, televisions and cellphones to these programs (often for a significant fee), but chances are they’re just adding to the lucrative trade in e-waste which endangers workers and pollutes the environment overseas.

It’s being recycled, but it’s being recycled in the most horrific way you can imagine” said Jim Pruckett of the Basel Action Network (BAN), a Seattle-based environmental group

“we’re preserving our own environment, but contaminating the rest of the world.”

One way that we can  help to reduce ewaste is by considering to buy and sell pre-owned or used consumer electronics like computers, gaming, PC hardware, cellphones and iPods. Trading in these productsreduces the demand for buying them new.

With the green bandwagon pacing ahead, it’s up to Americans to scrutinize and differentiate between those companies who make no impact but plenty of noise, and those who are genuinely concerned with effecting change over profit.

It’s no surprise to most that at the end of the product lifecycle, PC heaven is actually more like a PC hell.

Guiya is the largest e-waste site on earth according to wikipedia, where much of the e-waste from the rest of the world has been sent since the 1980s.

There, 5,500 e-waste businesses preside over a staggering 30,000 peasant workers. According to a local government website, these businesses process 1.5 million tons, creating $75 million each year, its single source of revenue.

The reason is that it’s 10 times cheaper to export this waste into China (data from US Environmental Protection Agency) than to safely recycle it here - the labor intensity of the task and safety rules drastically increase costs.

In Guiya there are no such safety rules, and as for labor, well… life is cheap to say the least.

Green recycling firms may not be so green

What many folks don’t realize is that recycling companies who charge to recycle our electronics may in fact be sending it to China too.

I’m not going to specifically red flag any of them, but I have been to quite a few of their websites and there’s plenty of velvety terms like ’safely dispose of your monitor’ - but nothing to be found concerning how and where it is actually done.

I think that if it was done locally they’d be singing about it from the Golden Gate bridge.

Here in the US, we scrap 400 million electronics products a year and generated 2.6 million tons of e-waste in 2005, a figure now being dwarfed by modern statistics awaiting varification. That year a UN report exposed that up to 13 million metric tons of e-waste was being generated annually as people were more readily upgrading laptops and PCs and throwing out old models.

Extracting precious metals from circuit boards

Metal extraction of circuit boards along with open dumping of waste and ash leaks residue into the open water and streams.

This has destroyed the well water and ground water of Guiyu, and has made it highly toxic and undrinkable for distant villages who also rely on the same water supply down stream.

A sad testament to his future

Undercover agents from Greenpeace collected water samples from the Jung River and surrounding streams for testing in Hong Kong and discovered lead content to be 190 times higher than safe level set by the World Health Organization.

This has been the cause of irreversible neurological damage among children as well as renal disease, cardiovascular effects and reproductive toxicity.

The official lead poisoning rate among children in Guiyu in 2006 was a crippling 70%, somthing that will plague them for the rest of their lives and rob survivors of any potential.

Circuit boards typically contain gold, silver and other precious metals and are easily extracted by heating causing a cloud of toxic eye watering pollution that permanently hangs over Guiyu.

No end in site - so what can be done?

With the scrap metal market booming and the rising value of recyclable circuit boards there is unlikely to be any end soon for Guiyu.

John Biggs at Crunch Gear in his article states “we should start talking with our wallets to the fools and damn fools who churn out piece after piece of quickly obsolete electronics.

I don’t know the answer to the problem, friends, but fully recyclable electronics is definitely a start.”

I agree it’s a start, but we’re a long way from this goal, which is hindered more by feasible technology solutions than anything else. Trade 2 save will target the pre-owned electronics market to encourage consumers to sell or trade-in their used computers, video cards and memory as well as cell phones, gaming and movies and also to buy pre-owned too when they can.

In the meantime we could also think about how often we need to upgrade and when we should consider buying pre-owned to reduce this mountain of e-waste and suffering.

Trade 2 save are calling on IT managers throughout the USA to consider carefully their ‘new’ buying practices when comes to their firm’s IT requirements. The call goes one step further than the Forrester report written by analyst Galen Schreck “Five Green IT Trends That Will Impact the Infrastructure and Operations Professionals.” Schreck cautioned that IT managers need to take proactive measures now and address tomorrow’s growing environmental concerns.

“…expect sourcing and procurement teams to continue making green demands on suppliers …(sourcing) executives will likely have a large role in ensuring that suppliers meet these requirements…”

CIOs are turning to service providers to help them meet their green goals; the report predicts that the green IT service market will expand to $1.75 billion by 2010.

End-of-life management of IT equipment is continuing to grow in importance, “Don’t be surprised to see green business initiatives stretch beyond the data center to other parts of you company.”

The report also gave advice to address the growing wave of environmental concern and learning more about current energy consumption in order to take steps to lower it.

Denis Ramirez, trade 2 save CTO, criticizes the report for falling short of the mark. Ramirez “the proper disposal for recycling of old computer equipment and the efficient use of energy is a given which doesn’t necessarily need preaching… what does need more focus is environmentally conscious purchasing of pre-owned electronics and computing which cost less and give a company a negative Carbon Rating… if US firms purchased just 10% of their computer equipment pre-owned or refurbished, it would cut e-waste by millions of tons each year.”

trade 2 save is being launched at the end of the year specifically to encourage more Americans to buy and sell pre-owned or used so that computer hardware and consumer electronics last longer by being used by more than one person in its lifetime.

Thandie Newton has criticized in no uncertain terms the throw away society brought on by “out of control manufacturing”. The British Style Goddess called upon fashion icons to help the environment and buy second hand clothes as an example – something the folks of Lake Providence have done for decades.

Newton spoke frankly about how “out of control manufacturing has become, and the excess and pollution that’s caused by it… “Vintage (clothing) is not only glorious and stylish, it’s also the way forward in terms of recycling. Whenever I go out to vintage stores, I wonder why we ever buy new things.”

As a fashion icon, Newton has rightly used her image to direct attention towards an industry which she can have greater influence over. However, her environmental principles closely match what trade 2 save advocates for the consumer electronics industry.

With design and style now playing dominant roles in the development of consumer electronics, products are now seen as fashion accessories as opposed to functional items.

The rise of the throw away society is a comparatively new phenomenon, and has provided many benefits to the global economy in terms of productivity, international trade, and the rise from poverty of now prosperous nations such as India and China through manufacturing exports.

Though second hand clothing in the UK is limited to the confines of charity shops, in the US, second hand clothing stores are big business, with profitable outfits such as Crossroads Trading Co. and the Buffalo Exchange now having dozens of stores between them.

We’ll try to contact Thandie Newton’s press secretary to hear her views on pre-owned electronics and the growing crisis of e-waste.