E-waste might be one of the biggest misnomers in the history of nomery -- the image it creates in the mind is of a bunch of email and document files clogging up your local internet pipes. The
reality of it is that electronic waste is rapidly populating ever-growing landfill areas in so-called developing countries (they're poor, just call a spade a spade) and the issue has now garnered the attention of the
United Nations. The UN Environment Programme has issued a wideranging report warning that e-waste in China and South Africa could double or even quadruple within the next decade, whereas India could experience a five-fold rise. Major hazards exist in the unregulated and informal recycling of circuit boards and techno gadgets, as processes like backyard incineration for the retrieval of gold generate toxic gases while also being wildly inefficient. The whole point of the report is to encourage some global cooperation in setting up modern and safe recycling facilities in the affected countries to ameliorate the problem, though being generally more careful in our consumption and
disposal of electronics wouldn't do the environment's chances any harm either.
posted February 23rd 2010 5:40AM
Good thing we are all using LCD's now, they'll take up less space ...
/irony
Hey look! It's District 9!
@finnschi a lot easier for the backs of 6-year olds too.
@finnschi
I would not trust the UN to run a bath.
@powermite That's not funny, man. You should feel sad they are living that place.
Regardless of the plan they think up, there's still tons upon tons of rubbish coming from the computer industry. All that stuff has got to go *somewhere*.
@montymintypie
Those people are making a living getting precious metals out of our waste. It isn't like they are victims and someone is holding a gun to their.....wait err that is China, so maybe they are.
i saw this on TV. A guy working there said the rich countries that send their waste there, aren't rid of that waste, because fish and chicken around that region is exported to other countrys, so they eat the poison they produce
//sry for bad English
You would think that given the finite supply of oil for making plastics and the shortage of metals globally, discarded gadgets would be disassembled and recycled in the the way that cars are. This would also provide jobs and cheap materials in 'developing' countries.
Personally I think these landfill sites will be quarried in the future when metal and plastic is in short supply.
@thunderbollock many things cost far more to recycle than to create (say turning a used piece of toilet paper into a new napkin... thats probably why recycled paper has a brown tint btw), and recycling doesn't always produce a product w/ the quality people expect.
@Ducman69
You recycle your used toliet paper?
@PcMadness And into napkins nonetheless. Now, picture that in your head. :D
@2late2die
(Slowly puts down his napkin, staring at it in disgust. Never to use one again. From now on he will only use hand sanitizer and air dryers....)
We don't need to send aid to these countrys, just electricity, then they can use all our old stuff.
Problem solved.
Let's hope no one comes up with an idea like in the anime 'Planates' where humans essentially treat space as their 'dumping' grounds for waste. Or WALL-E comes to mind...
is "call a spade a spade" a racist term?
@cashclientel spade as a derogatory racial term for darkies is a 19th century invention, the adage from the 14th. sorry if I mistake your humor for another case of hypersensitive liberal crybabies I wish would have had pro-choice mothers. =p
@cashclientel
It's origins in English are not racist.
Of course, some people can find racism in almost any context.
For example, there were some people in my high school who claimed to be offended by the term "black board".
Go figure.
@Ducman69
The phrase to call a spade a spade is to call things by their real names, without any euphemism or mincing of matters; to use plain or blunt language; to be straightforward to the verge of rudeness.
Its ultimate source is Plutarch's Apophthegmata Laconica (178B) which has την σκαφην σκαφην λεγοντας (ten skafen skafen legontas). σκαφη (skafe) means "basin, trough", but it was mis-translated as ligo "shovel" by Erasmus in his Apophthegmatum opus. Lucian De Hist. Conscr. (41) has τα συκα συκα, την σκαφην δε σκαφην ονομασων (ta suka suka, ten skafen de skafen onomason) "calling a fig a fig, and a trough a trough".
The phrase was introduced to English in 1542 in Nicolas Udall's translation of Erasmus, Apophthegmes, that is to saie, prompte saiynges. First gathered by Erasmus:
Philippus aunswered, that the Macedonians wer feloes of no fyne witte in their termes but altogether grosse, clubbyshe, and rusticall, as they whiche had not the witte to calle a spade by any other name then a spade.
It is evident that the word spade refers to the instrument used to move earth, a very common tool. The same word was used in England and in Holland, Erasmus' country of origin.
@Ducman69 I wasn't making a joke or some kind of objection to the term - it was an honest question.
@Ducman69 Darkies? Has this site become stormfront.org?
@dsquare20 internet. serious business.
And it dosent help with electronic company bringing out newer better technology each month, making your current ones look like rubbish that will end up in E-Waste
@OCEAN CLAK
Exploitation. The people of these poor countries die in the factories from the production of these products, and then they die when these products are thrown away. At least they have their slave wages.
The recent Foxconn news, and the n-hexane story sound like the makings of a horrific documentary about Apple device production, and they're supposedly the most environmentally friendly.
@Luke Well, according to Greanpeace you mean...
@(Unverified) *facepalm* I mean Greenpeace. I have no idea what that other thing would be.
We don't need to be sending blank checks to the governments in these areas. We are already paying for the disposal of this waste, its just not being handled appropriately.
A simple solution is just like the United States addressed underage sex tourism by US law overriding any foreign laws on age of consent and the like for US citizens abroad. Doesn't matter if its legal to pick up a 14yr old hooker in Brazil, you still go to jail if you return to the US. The same can apply to US and EU businesses paying for waste disposal in foreign countries.
No matter where the company finds the lowest bidder for waste disposal, they have the responsibility of ensuring that proper disposal and recycling facilities exist. If not, they are fined the same as they would be in their host countries.
Prices will go up, but where there is money and demand, a market will be created immediately, I assure you.
@Ducman69 all the regulation isn't going to do squat if you can't enforce it. How do you catch a person who has gone abroad to have sex with an underage child? How? Do you expect the person to declare that on the way through customs? Do you expect the local authorities to arrest those sex tourists? If they cared they would have closed down these brothels long time ago, but they don't, and the market continues to exist.
Now for recycling electronics. Unless you start tracking the electronics as they get recycled you can't really be sure that they end will end up. Companies will always do what maximizes their profits. Hi-tech incinerators? Expensive. Child labor in 3rd world countries? Cheap.
I do agree that it's about time to have a comprehensive electronic recycling bill through congress (maybe there is already a law in place.) But this will depend on consumers recycling their electronics instead of throwing them in the garbage bin. Once the electronics end up in a landfill it will be much harder to track how or where they will end up.
@poached Uhm, almost every advocate group has stated it is the most effective step that has been taken to date to reduce the sex tourism industry.
Big businesses like Dell and HP and the like will do what maximizes their profits. Huge fines when caught not only hurt profits, but even worse are a risk, and such risks wreck havoc on business plans.
It doesn't have to be perfect, there is no such thing as perfect, it just has to be better than other alternatives. You pump money, MY money, into these foreign governments of impoverished nations (hint: even more corrupt than our own), there is no guarantee even a fraction will be spent as we want. More importantly, even in fantasy land with rainbows and unicorns, if you totally fixed dumping grounds in five poor countries and prices went up, the market would simply demand an almost immediate shift to cheaper markets elsewhere. Putting the burden on the companies to ensure that they aren't knowingly dumping in non-recycling facilities above a certain minimum health/safety code prevents this from happening.
What'd be extra nice, is that we could run such high-tech recycling facilities domestically, and keep the money in the US/EU.
@poached And off topic, but just in case you are curious, the CIA worked w/ Thailand government on a huge underage sex sting in Bangkok and Pattaya very recently. Moreover, such predators know the law, and with it common knowledge that they can serve jail time if exposed, they open themselves up for extortion in those countries. "Girl was underage, we have her confession and pics/video... pay us now or we turn you in and you go to jail". Fear of extortion, getting a predator label, serving jail time, and having all friends, family, and business associates at home aware of your deed is a pretty powerful deterrent. A lot better than just sending checks over to poor country governments and saying "please spend this wisely to achieve our goals"... riiight. =p
@Ducman69 You can't really force companies to recycle consumer's waste. Instead, if you want to have regulation, it would be on the consumers: you, me, us. After all, you don't ship your milk cartons to the grocery store that you bought the milk from, do you? What needs to happen is recycling of electronics just like we have for paper and plastic. We can throw the e-waste in a new bin and have the junk be sorted locally in the states and the recycled material sold back to companies. It's a great business model, I think.
If only they didn't charge too much to dispose of them properly. Grab and toss it into the neighbor's yard is the most efficient way to do it.
I happen to work in computer recycling. We're kinda small, but we process over 5 million pounds of electronics a year and keep them out of landfills.
here in the philippines you would see LOTS of stores selling japanese surplus tvs. there are only a few environment friendly disposing/recycling companies and most of the products end up in landfills.
sad fact.
Don't you all just love your capitalism now! You can't *handle* a well regulated system like Europe.
@FauxNews
Are you serious dude? We can't handle a "well regulated" system like the EU? You do realize that the entire EU is on the verge of collapse b/c of their out of control spending right? If you doubt me I invite you to do a little research specifically on Greece and its current economic state. The U.S. isn't too far behind either, at the rate we are spending. There are a number of reasons why this is happening. By talking to anyone that actually understands how the economy works they will tell you that it is due to this movement away from a capitalistic system.
But anyways, if capitalism is as evil as you say, what would be the solution? More government regulation? Less freedom for everyone (including businesses)?
See, I take articles like this with a grain of salt. Yes E-waste is a problem that will more than likely need to be dealt with sooner rather than later. Anyone watching these videos should understand that they are made with an agenda at the heart of the issue. 90% of the time it's an anti-capitalist agenda. I'll point anyone who doubts this to a video called, "The Story Of Stuff". They find an issue and blow it way out of proportion to suit their needs.
@EvilKid Everyone has an agenda. Being anti-capitalist is an agenda. Doesn't make the information any less true.
I hope this gets a wider exposure now. Greenpeace made alot of videos about the problem like this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JZey9GJQP0
Guess what. The US is only one of two countries in the world that is actually allowed to export its ewaste. Imagine that. The pollution that is generated during the "recycling" process is unbelieveable. Go to current.com and search up Vanguard and ewaste. The story of recycling in China.
Look at those dumb kids inhaling the toxic fumes! haha
"ameliorate" ? Wow. That's a keeper.
Somebody's been playing some Diablo II.
Hurray for our throw-away society!
/sarcasm
That's why I throw my etrash along with my regular trash, so poor developing country don't suffer from the trash that is use to onl benefit me and my family.
@k2001 I hope you were sarcastic.
Not separating your electronics from regular trash is the problem. Electronics contain toxic material and if buried could leach the toxins into the soil. If you throw out your electronics that way, you are killing the environment. But there are companies out there that separate the e-waste from regular waste, then bundle that e-waste onto a barge and ship it to a third world country, thus creating the mess you are reading about in this article.
I'm afraid properly recycling your electronics isn't enough, but stop consuming is the answer. If you keep your electronics instead of the best and greatest all the time, you save money and you help the environment, and isn't that something we can all do?
Didn't Dell change its ways after they were caught/exposed to be shipping e-trash to all the poor countries?
I've had it up to HERE with the UN. Since the global warming scam has blown up in their face, I don't want to hear their defense of ANYTHING. Oh, I'm sorry, it's not called global warming anymore. Now it's "climate change". Where I come from, we used to call it "the weather".
Someone else take the lead on issues like this. Someone that can be trusted not to get everyone in a frenzy and lay a bunch of new "recovery fees" on those of us who don't buy a new smartphone every 6 months. I'm in favor of companies being REQUIRED to buy back their own electronics to dispose of them properly AND have no problem end users picking up the cost of such (return shipping, etc). I'm far from being an environmentalist, but let's be responsible for our own actions and product use.
E-waste is no different than most other waste. Some countries do not handle any waste very well.
If you were to remove the e-waste, there still would be tremendous amounts of other waste---all handled poorly in these areas.
The problem is how waste is handled. Period!
For example, in China, there are rivers choked with chrome waste and animal carcasses from the leather industries. Is this an e-waste. Certainly not.
Many other Asian nations aren't much better. Of course the US and EU nations only appear better, but only because the bar is set so low, and because they are better at playing hide-the-garbage.
Why do you U.N. even care bout other countries. You don't even help out. All you do is it on your nice desk dress up pretty. And don't even BOTHER HELPING OTHERS AT ALL. Too me you are taking lots lots of money from other people for not doing a thing. TALK TALK TALK that's all you guys do at the U.N.
@Inspector Gadget80
tell that to the families of dozens of UN workers killed in the Haiti earthquake. Many of them were Americans too.