A good e-waste regulation isn't for tomorrow...

We know from the other blogs that a good e-waste regulation isn't for tomorrow. Because of that, it is very easy for the industrialised countries, which produce a lot of e-waste, to move it to developing countries. Those poor and developing countries have to treat all the e-waste and, as we already know, the treatment of all our stuff can process big health and pollution problems. The Basel convention tries to do something against those big issues and the severe consequences of all that transport. You should also know that it isn't just e-waste, but also all kinds of other hazardous waste the developed countries transport to the developing ones. The Basel convention tries to do something against that. The 4 most important objectives of the Basel convention are

1) to treat the hazardous waste as closely as possible to the source

2) to help the developing countries to treat all the waste as environment-friendly as possible

3) to limit the quantity of all the dangerous substances and

4) as I already mentioned, to limit the transport between the countries in the world.

It is very unfortunate that a big country and world power as the US has signed but not ratified the convention. But in spite of that, I think that the Basel convention is a very good initiative in absence of a clear e-waste regulation. Almost all the countries in the world have signed and ratified it!

(Source: http://www.basel.int/)

Mathieu Delmulle

Four tips to avoid e-waste

I want to react on Matthias his second blog and want to say that I totally agree with his first sentence. In my opinion, you can also say that besides the government and business life, which try to minimise the e-waste, also private life can do a lot of things! I found a very good text on the internet, and in the text, the writer, Russel Morgan, gives tips and says what people and companies can do with their old PC's that are stored in an old attic room. The first thing you can do, says Morgan, is to donate them to people who really need your computer and can still use it. You just have to be careful that you wip your hard drive clean so that they can't find personal stuff. A second possibility is to recycle your PC with an independent company: on the Internet you definitely find your local computer recycler. The last tip that also refers to the blog of Matthias is to recycle with a manufacturer, because, as Matthias already said, they also see the big problems for the environment. HP is one of those companies. They have already recycled a lot of hardware and print cartridges. If we take a look on the web page of HP, we can indeed see that they do a lot of efforts for recycling and reusing!

(Source: http://www.smartbiz.com/article/articleprint/1525/-1/58)

Mathieu Delmulle

Problems and solutions of e-waste

In this blog I want to talk about the serious problems and the possible solutions of e-waste. As we can read in the other blogs, there is a lot of e-waste on our beautiful earth. Technical solutions are created, but we need a good regulation, a collecting system and the attention of every consumer before the technical solutions can be applied. To start the discussion about the big problem, I will give some shocking statistics about e-waste. In the USA, 2 % of all the detritus on landfills is e-waste. That is not much, you would think, but you should know that 70 % of heavy metals on those landfills come from those 2 % of dumped electronica. That is staggering! So what do we do as rich and developed countries? We transport all our waste to poor countries and from that moment, those developing countries (with few environment laws) have all the problems and pollution. E- waste is especially dangerous when you don’t treat it well: it is cancerogenic and very toxic!

(Source: http://www.dosomething.org/blog/chatterbox/shocking-reality-about-e-waste-recycling)

Mathieu Delmulle

A good 'second life'...

As a reaction on the blog of Matthias that dates of the second of November, I'd like to say that his statement in the last sentence is good, but not everything. My opinion is that an e-waste regulation would be great but that we, all the consumers and producers of cellphones, computers and Ipods, can do more than regulations can ever do. To prove my statement, I will start in my own family. In our kitchen, we have a cupboard where all our old and not longer used cellphones are placed in. The moment I opened that cupboard, I was a little bit surprised of everything which was in it: there were no more than 8 cellphones inside and all of them were in perfect working condition! Because nobody uses them anymore; you can call them e-waste. I thought about a good 'second life' for it and after some googling, I found a company where you can sell your old mobile phones. The company is called 'cell for cash'. On their web page you can , with a simple click on your keyboard, sell your old phone for a reasonable price. You put it in a box the company has sent you and after they have controlled the quality of the phone, you recover your money. Then it is the intention to sell your phone in developing countries. If it can't be sold anymore, the company offers you 'free recycling' for the phone, which is good for the environment.

The conclusion of the working of the company is that there are 2 advantages: you help the environment and it is good for your portfolio!

(Source: http://www.cellforcash.com/ )

Mathieu Delmulle

Nokia’s recycling programme

To prove that good things are already being done in order to prevent electronic equipment from becoming landfill, we’ll have a closer look at the way Nokia deals with mobile phones that aren’t used anymore.

The company offers people the opportunity to bring back their old mobile phones. To make all of this possible, they set up take back centres almost all over the world. A striking fact is that they accept mobile phones from every brand. These collected phones then follow a recycling programme, while Nokia makes sure that all used components are recyclable. This has become a source of raw materials.

I believe this is a very important signal Nokia gives. Especially because the company is a market leader and therefore has a lot of influence. This could encourage other producers of electronic equipment to focus more on the environment.

Jonas Dauwe

Sources:

http://ewasteguide.info/nokia-retrieve-old

http://www.topnews.in/recycling-ewaste-campaign-rolled-nokia-india-2105195

Future prospects of e-waste

The processing of electronic waste has become one of the biggest challenges in recent years. Although phrasing an exact prediction is very difficult, the consumption of electronic equipment will continue to rise without any doubt. According to a recent study implemented by Pike Research, the amount of e-waste we have to cope with will peak by 2015. Afterwards, we should be able to reduce the disadvantageous environmental effects thanks to a policy based on government regulation, initiatives by producers and consumer awareness. We already discussed the importance of the government and the producers in detail in this blog. But like Mathias already cited, consumers have to think ecological as well. How aware are people that their televisions and computers contain toxic elements? Who really thinks about the environment when buying a new cell phone? Everyone knows that glass should be separated from plastic, but who can tell what is classified as e-waste? According to experts it’s important to inform the public more about the danger the growing use of electronic goods causes in order to solve this problem.

Jonas Dauwe

Sources:

http://www.reportage-enviro.com/2010/05/consumer-awareness-crucial-in-solving-e-waste-problems/

http://www.pikeresearch.com/newsroom/global-e-waste-crisis-is-worsening-but-the-tide-will-turn-in-2015

Is an international cooperation against e-waste possible?

In this blog I would like to react on a few important remarks Seppe Bodequin made in the last paragraph of his blog ‘The export of e-waste’ on the one hand and in his previous blog ‘It is possible to decrease e-waste without regulation by governments’ on the other hand.  In my opinion it’s obvious that a severe regulation is a necessity because most of the companies’ first concern still is to make a profit. An international accepted committee that controls every economical agent seems to be an ideal solution. But is this idea realistic?

The United Nations already called attention to the growing amount of e-waste, but the organization doesn’t have the possibility to give a binding advice. I think that it would be a good idea to bring together a group of people specialized in e-waste. Those experts should be independent from any country or political trend. I don’t agree with the suggestion that this committee should be able to punish countries that don’t respect the existing regulation. All of this because a committee that is part of both the legislature and the judiciary won’t ever be accepted by most of the countries. I also doubt about the efficiency of a punishing system. In my view a rewarding program would motivate companies more to recycle e-waste.

Jonas Dauwe